haikus on napkins at the kitchen table

i.

sweet potato pie

topped with marshmallows: a dish,

a euphemism

ii.

yellow fold-up chairs

aren't for seventeen-year-old

girls, not anymore

supposedly to

grow up is to nod while the

adults are talking

cross my ankles, chew,

swallow, scribble haikus that

they will never read

iii.

an appetizer

of political jargon

no 'soup or salad'

iv.

with apple cider

i wash down all the words i

know i shouldn't say

just to cram them in

boxes of five-seven-five

for a smile or two

from poets like me

dreamers, forever craving

something real; what's real?