by John Levy

(after Bashō)

My poems aren’t

really mine. Any more

than a frog

owns its croak

or its splash as it dives

beneath the green surface.

You see the surface translated

into language

ripples. (The frog invisible,

immersed.)

From Noon: An Anthology of Short Poems, Philip Rowland, editor, Tokyo: Isobar Press, 2019, page 47.