13 Monday Sep 2021
Posted in Gusts, poems and photos, Published Poems, tanka
to ward off
who knows what
i buy a dozen pencils
to be armed
just in case
***
covered quietly
by falling snow
in the woods
along with everything else
the deer’s remains
***
with three running lights
burning through the night
our neighbor’s house shipshape
on it journey
to tomorrow
-Gusts no. 33 spring/summer 2021
05 Sunday Sep 2021
Posted in Published Poems, tanka
could be I’m tired
or lost, but to close my eyes
and nod off
while the world goes on
gives me a certain peace
/
/
wind outside the mall
and as I wait
with my eyes closed
a killdeer calls
from another life
/
as I sit here
taking in the river view
I see my feelings for this life
quite like the trees
leaning slightly downstream
how ironic
coming to love
this life and world
and at the same time
letting it go
while planting bulbs
my wife unearths
a childhood cap gun of mine
I hold it
trying to grasp back then
scribbling,
that’s it,
what I do, and tell
the inquisitive stranger
who asks
what attracted me most
to the poem
had not so much to do
with the poem
but that she liked it
I asked him about his day
what he did
if he got enough sleep
and in response
a soulful look and purring
with thunder very close
our little dog
gets under my legs,
if only I could feel
so safe with myself
another ball game
and she wonders why
I’m so taken by the win and lose
as if our lives were
nothing like that
on the trail to the top
my family hikes best
during the time
they combine
to make light of me
my beer gone flat
but out of duty
I finish it–
living all these
middle-aged days
just when I was feeling
there is always
too much to do,
Cassiopeia so sharp
in the autumn night sky
by spontaneous consent
our subtle flirting
has played itself out-
our friendship will be all
the better for this
we work briskly
into the momentum of the day
a long list of what to do,
once all there was
was to fall in love
in the company of friends
our marriage takes on
an air of comfort
as we all attend to things
other than ourselves
it is love we all want
and all these ways
we go about getting it-
how strange in my secluded spot
a stranger finds me
pushed by the wind
at the far end of the sky
a few clouds…
I can see what I want
keeps changing too
ambivalence
I believe is what
I’ve come to sitting here
watching wave after wave
land itself
full of rain
the river races along
past everything here–
I can’t shake this sense
I’m living on borrowed time
watching
the smooth flow of water
over stones . .
how few of my thoughts
are new
beyond this life
that one old friend
I bump into over and over
promising that we’ll get together
again, someday
this complete enigma
of me wanting more solitude
then company in turn
on my terms
at just the right time
wondering if this is what
my parents felt,
in their own time
seeing a better past slip
ever further behind
all these years
in one house, one job
one town and in me―
too many changes to fathom
as I sweep away autumn leaves
those two birds flying
so close together
swiftly across the twilight sky―
a certain happy sad witness
I provide for them . . .
that point
in the evening
when both cats are in place
quietly bathing
while I read . . .
without fanfare
I drag the dead branch
to the brush pile
another day risen
and fallen from my life
for ten years
we’ve come to this lake
for vacation—
in the camera this year
your smile a little less
at the old parking lot
the sparrows bathe
in a big puddle
sometimes I’m so happy
just to be here as witness
between chores
I study my hands
as if they might hold
something
I should know
to show me
the spirit of a train
I wish for one to come―
these overgrown tracks
I walk along
I keep it ambiguous
knowing full well
a defined reason
for feeling down
can be dismissed
the envelope to me
sealed carefully with tape
on every seam
when opened, reveals
absolutely nothing
my youth spent
gathering strength and solace
of friends near and far–
these short years later
losing them one by one
01 Sunday Dec 2019
Posted in americana, Chapbooks, haiku, Haiku Way of Life, Lynx,, tanka, Published Poems, senryu, tanka
Tags
book review, chapbook, family, family life, haiku, home, homework, life, poems, poetry, senryu, tanka, writing
Homework by Tom Clausen. Saddle-stitched, full color cover, 4″ x 6″, 36 pages. $10., ppd. ISBN: 1-903543-00-2. Order from Snapshots Press, 132 Crosby, Liverpool, L23 8XS, England.
To quote the jacket notes: “Focusing squarely on domestic life, this collection of haiku, senryu, and tanka is often funny, often sad and always paradoxically both familiar and eye-opening.” It cannot be said better nor more succinctly what this newest book by Tom Clausen contains. I can only add my continuing praise for Tom’s work. It is always a revelation and delight how he seizes on the tiniest experience, and through his examination of it and the cool observation his own feelings, carries it over into a major event. This leaves the reader wondering, “Now, why did I not notice that?” and “Why did I not think of that as material for a poem?”. It seems that tanka is especially designed for the methods of Tom Clausen. Even when aware of the smallest thing, he is also aware of how that thing or event is affecting him. This occurs even in his haiku.
While some purists might fault his haiku for not being closely enough aligned with the nature-nature viewpoint, his sensibilities are absolutely accurate for tanka. This collection gains, I think, by the inclusion of his haiku (which often portray the lighter moments of family living). They seem to play off and actually highlight the attributes of his tanka. Altogether, the editing and arrangement of the poems seems especially fine and relevant. For anyone who has grown up in a family or is living in a family now, this book will take away those terrible moments of aloneness when one felt that no one else in the world ever had such moments of doubt, despair and pure undiluted joy. Tom has been there, and he has the courage to face them directly and honestly, and to continue to hang with the feelings until he has created pure poetry out of them.
no longer me
it proves a mystery who it is
I’ve become
walking around this house
with my family there inside
I sort of knew
my coffee cup
was empty –
so much I look in it
just to see
The sensitivity of the editor, John Barlow, is shown in the choice of a drawing done by Tom’s young daughter, Emma Clausen, as cover along with the insider joke of the title of the book – Homework. Delight piles on delight with this one. Review written by Jane Reichhold
01 Sunday Dec 2019
Posted in Lynx,, tanka, Published Poems, tanka
Tags
Lynx XVII:2 June, 2002
those two birds
flying so close together
swiftly across the twilight sky –
a certain happy sad witness
i provide for them
**
out the car window
through a snow flurry
she studies the sun –
my wife warns her
not to look too close
**
the sweeps and swoops
of swallows
all manner of lovely curves
and you in jeans bent over
just to pick up a stick
**
my daughter shrill
and bumping into me
until i tell her to stop –
how hollow knowing
she was just glad to see me
**
before our marriage
my mother told my wife
that it was her married years
that were the loneliest
in her life…
**
she must read my mind
this fancy i have for her –
how beautifully
she blushed
the time she saw me peek
**
how old it becomes
but no denying
the appeal of this quest
for what is new
and turned out latest…
Tom Clausen
01 Sunday Dec 2019
Posted in poems and photos, Published Poems, tanka
Lynx- XVII:1, February, 2002
out in the yard
the crow caws crazily
as if it knows my life
quite like
the compost i leave…
**
with my son
we pass the house
where he was conceived –
a certain run down look
weeds in the window box
**
not much celebration
to this winter solstice
but the neighbors maple
just big enough for a squirrel
and two bird nests
**
the deep blue sky
goes so far
yet the photo has borders
like those we come to
in our love…
**
its a little flaw
i’ve come to accept
as it may be…
these overmatched feelings
loving too much
**
cold rain
in another town
the streets empty –
from one house
a gift of wood smoke
**
this complete enigma
of me wanting more solitude,
then company in turn
on my terms
at just the right time
**
I have seen the cat
sleep most of the day
and yet seem satisfied
my calendar says to show
a cat a piece of gold
18 Friday Oct 2019
Posted in americana, cats, Gusts, mailboxes, nature, poems and photos, Published Poems, tanka, Tom poems at other sites
13 Tuesday Nov 2018
Posted in autumn, gorges, Ithaca, lakes and rivers, leaves, nature, parks, paths, poems and photos, tanka, trees, waterfalls
15 Friday Jun 2018
Posted in americana, close up details, flowers, gardens, Ithaca, landscapes, nature, plants, poems and photos, spring, tanka
19 Thursday Apr 2018
Posted in americana, close up details, Ithaca, leaves, nature, parks, poems and photos, ponds, puddles, reflections, spring, tanka, trees, Wabi Sabi, water reflections, winter
Tags
leaves, nature, photography, photos, poetry, ponds, puddles, reflections, tanka, trees
my wife asks
what it is I want-
there it is, that question
not even I
can answer
19 Monday Mar 2018
Posted in americana, close up details, Ithaca, nature, paths, poems and photos, puddles, reflections, spring, tanka, Wabi Sabi, water reflections
Tags
nature, photography, photos, poems, poetry, reflection, tanka, trees
so many chances
in a day
to say something to you,
but here it is
growing late
