Drunken Robins by David Oates
Drunken Robins by David Oates
About the Author
David Oates teaches math and English and hosts Wordland, a public-radio show on WUGA, Athens, devoted to poetry, fiction, and comedy. His own writing has been published in little magazines and newspapers. His previous haiku and senryu collection is Shifting with My Sandwich Hand. Sow’s Ear Press published his short-story and poetry collection Night of the Potato. He has worked as a reporter, and wrote for the comic strip Shoe in the 80’s.
David Oates writes:
This is a collection of favorites from over twenty years’ accumulation of haiku and senryu, mostly written while living in rural Appalachia for 6 years and then Athens, Georgia for 16. I have tried to follow the precept of catching the crucial details of a moment that struck me, giving those to you without my specific reaction.
I try to make each poem as brief as it reasonably can be, while following the usual practice among the majority of serious haiku practitioners of not focusing on 17 syllables in 3 lines. In following the advice of Basho, I have not tried to write as if I were in medieval Japan, but rather have drawn inspiration from the nature and human nature I see around me.
Sample Poems from Drunken Robins by David Oates:
mountain farmer tends
the burning field’s margin
scorched boot smell
engineering classroom
different colored chalk rectangles
on the light brown ceiling
he teaches Logic and Ethics
never picked for jury
rushing by the scenic overlook—again
older brother, as Easter bunny,
steers the youngest towards eggs
as the middle fills her basket
little boy sleeps with a smile
bulldozer dream
the sight of home’s hills
after a week at the beach
first swallow of wine
rusty old car
decorated today—
“JUST MARRIED”
gray dawn,
motion-detecting porch light
flicks on
as a catbird hops
after miscarriage
against the wall
a new crib
Times Square
mud puddle
flashing
the poet conjures angels
in a rolling voice—
his dog loudly, steadily,
licks herself
