Unplayed Harmonica

by Michael Dylan Welch and Carmen Sterba

Winner of an honorable mention in the 2018 San Francisco International Rengay Competition sponsored by the Haiku Poets of Northern California. First published in Mariposa #41, Autumn/Winter 2019, page 29. This rengay also appeared in This Morning's Tides: Commencement Bay Haiku 10-Year Anniversary Anthology (Tacoma, Washington: Commencement Bay Haiku, 2022), page 89. Originally written on 8 March 2009, on the road between Portland, Oregon and University Place, Washington.

tree fort—

the trumpet’s spit valve

stuck shut Michael

a toy piano

out in the rain Carmen

a few empty seats—

the timpani roll fades

into dusk Michael

foreclosure—

unplayed harmonica

on the mantelpiece Carmen

a stringless banjo

from papa’s attic Michael

ring of primroses

in an upturned French horn—

Easter morning Carmen