Haiku on the Bathroom Floor at 5:30 am

Haiku are poems
with prescribed syllabic form
and themes of nature.

These follow the rules,
but they don’t deal with nature—
they’re not real haiku.

(Why does “ha-i-ku”
take three beats in Japanese,
but in English, two?)

Yesterday it rained.
The sky was strange and lovely.
I stood out in it.

I might have been drunk,
but it’s not a hangover—
I think I’m just sick.

This is the worst pain
my stomach has ever felt.
I wish I would die.

Maybe I’m poisoned.
The salsa Patty brought us
was way too potent.

I’ve not slept enough—
it’s early in the morning;
I sway on my feet.

I lie on my back
in Corpse Pose and breathe deeply.
The floor is so cold!

I try to use it,
to acknowledge, diffuse it,
but I’m distracted.

I have to crunch up
in a seiza or Child’s Pose
for the ache to ease.

I make myself small,
my forehead on the cold floor,
my knees under me.

Too sleepy to think—
at least in cogent phrases—
focus with haiku...

“The gray kitten leapt
on the nearest piece of flesh
and bit ‘til it bled.”

My guts fucking hurt,
and the floor is fucking cold.
What the hell—kittens?!

I will spend today
getting last night’s lost sleep back,
if this pain will stop.