War tramples Kyiv culture.
The art museum’s windows are blown out.
The concert hall is shrouded in dust.
The statue of Taras Shevchenko, lauded poet,
is pitted and pocked by bullets. Dead silence.
These images beg my imagination
for color, for sound, this pen.
ringing the base
of the bell tower
sprouts of green grass
Drifting Sands Haibun #21 (May 2023) and
Tan-ku For Ukraine: A World Haiku and Tanka Anthology, ed.
Dimitar Anakiev. Sofia, Bulgaria: gabriell-e-lit Publishing House, 2024.