jack galmitz | so what you do | i fell from the sky

So what do you
think of this
blue
after
noon
a canary’s belly
carved in
the bark
of a tree
it may
have been night
and the young
couldn’t let go
they
were two sides
of an Indian head
coin
that’s how it started
the rest you knew
they could only fly
under the bridge
at best in the blood
bloom of the boot
to the clouds
dreamt by no church
in the west
ern
hemisphere

I fell from the sky
by the railroad tracks
lucky for me
there was a car chassis
And landed in the reeds

to sleep in (such ease)
I could see
that curve ahead
where the trains
disappear
into the green
of another year

lucky for me
I fell from the sky
It’s lonely there

Jack Galmitz

was born in N.Y.C. in 1951. He now resides in Elmhurst, N.Y. He began writing haiku in 1999. Intermittently, some of his poems have been chosen to appear in the annual anthologies published by Red Moon Press, and he was selected as one of the featured poets for A New Resonance 4: Emerging Voices in English-Language Haiku (Red Moon Press, 2005). In 2006, he was awarded the Ginyu Prize (chosen as the most accomplished books of haiku by the World Haiku Association) for his first two collections, A New Hand and Driftwood. He has sparsely written critiques of some haiku collections – the works of Tateo Fukutomi and the collection of Ban’ya Natsuishi’s poems in A Future Waterfall. In 2010, he was awarded the Kusamakura Grand Prize in the foreign language category. He received a Runner-up award in the newly-inaugurated Vladimir Devidé Haiku Awards (2011). Two of his haiku received a Zatuei (Haiku of Merit) Award in the Vanguard category (World Haiku Review, December 2011). He has recently been named “contributing editor” at Roadrunner Haiku Journal. He has been honored to have been chosen to be an Associate of The Haiku Foundation, created by Jim Kacian.

Books Published: A New Hand (Wasteland Press, 2006); Driftwood (Wasteland Press, 2007); For a Sparrow: Haiku [Translations into Macedonian by Igor Isakovski] (Skopje, Macedonia: Blesok, 2007, in Macedonian and English]; Balanced is the Rose (Wasteland Press, 2008); The Effects of Light (AHA Online Books, 2002); Of All the Things (Ascent Aspirations Publishing); Sky Theatre (Ink: Literary E-Zine); A Simple Circle & Rockdove (Traveling Forms: Japanese/English Haiku);  The Coincidence of Stars [ed., Chris Gordon] (ant ant ant ant ant, 2011) and yards & lots edited by Middle Island Press.