"Half Past a Monkey’s Ass" & "Dark Summer Winds (Tanka)" by Jason Ryberg

Half Past a Monkey’s Ass

Well it’s half-past a

monkey’s ass (or a quarter-

past a nightmare) and

my skull is a glass

jar full of fireflies and all

the clouds in the next

county over are

aflame and the wind is

stirring things up a

little and there’s a

wolf with a wounded bird in

its mouth and a dead

tree on a hill with

nothing but phantom limbs and

the frogs are tapping

out some kind of Morse

Code to each other and there’s

an old beer bottle

sitting on a fence-

post (for who knows how many

years) upon which a

lone dragonfly is

perched trying to tune in his

tiny radio.

Dark Summer Winds (Tanka)

The sky belongs to

the bats and crickets at night,

but the dark summer 

winds smelling of mimosa

     and rain belong to the trees.