Dying Spark

by Rich Krivcher, John Thompson, and Michael Dylan Welch

First prize winner in 1998 Haiku Poets of Northern California rengay contest. At the time, HPNC did not publish its contest winners in Mariposa, so this rengay remained unpublished for many years. First published in Frogpond 30:3, Fall 2007, page 51. My verses were written and revised on 19 November and 24 December 1997 and 2 January 1998 in Foster City, California and Anacortes, Washington. Download or view the “Six Rengay” trifold, where this rengay also appears, on the Trifold Downloads page on my Graceguts website.

lightning flash—

a bug streak glows

on the windshield Rich

in the night heron’s beak

a wriggling glint of silver John

Roman ruin:

the candle sputtering

deep in the tunnel Michael

ten-wheeler hauling sheep

a spark from the mudflaps Rich

graveyard shift—

lighting one cigarette

with another John

photographing Hiroshima

the sudden flash Michael