Friday, February 20, 2026

A Room of My Own: Jagged Ramadan Moon Haiku

Against the Drowning Noise of Other Words, CCLXXXIII: "jagged Ramadan moon"

skeletal houses
jagged Ramadan moon
in each window


Note: My haiku below could be read as its prequel and sequel respectively:

Against the Drowning Noise of Other Words, XXX: "Al-Aqsa" 

distant boom, boom, boom ...
the first sliver of the moon 
over Al-Aqsa


FYI: Al-Aqsa is the compound of Islamic religious buildings that sit atop the Temple Mount in the Old City of Jerusalem.


Ramadan moon
behind skeletal houses
the edge of peace

Third Place, The Solitary Daisy Annual Haiku Contest, 2025


Added: to Joyce Carol Oates, who views art as a form of exploration and, at times, a transgression:

“My belief is that art should not be comforting; for comfort, we have mass entertainment and one another. Art should provoke, disturb, arouse our emotions, expand our sympathies in directions we may not anticipate and may not even wish.”


is it possible
to turn this jagged pain
into words?
the blank screen stares back
lit with my reflection


Added: Against the Drowning Noise of Other Words, CCLXXXIV: "howls of orphans"

Gaza skies tinged red …
the howls of orphans carried
from age into age
through one life to the next
while the baton never falls


Added: Trump Empire, Inc, LXXVII

eighty-five seconds 
to midnight of Human Fate...
the Doomday Clock
on your life, mine and the rest
ticks, ticking in the cold snap


FYI: the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists set the Doomsday Clock to 85 seconds to midnight on January 27, 2026the closest it has ever been to global catastrophe.

This January 27th, however, with nine countries now having nuclear weapons (and more undoubtedly in the offing), and our world in increasing turmoil...  the [US]'s spending $87 billion on its nuclear arsenal this year alone, while creating a future "Trump class" of warships that will be armed with nuclear missiles

No comments:

Post a Comment