salvage yard

old Volkswagen
father’s smile lingers
in the chrome

strolling the rows

the toughness
of worn hands
and weeds

of tossed diamonds

scavenging for parts
the second chance
we all deserve

Note: Italicized lines above are by Bryan Rickert.

Kat Lehmann

is a haiku poet, a potter, and a scientist based in Connecticut, USA. Her poetry has been nominated for Best of the Net and has been honored in The Haiku Foundation Touchstone Awards (individual poem), the Haiku Society of America Harold G. Henderson Haiku Award, and Japan’s Basho-an Award. She is a judge in the inaugural Trailblazer Contest. As a give-back to the larger community, Kat seeds free copies of her books in public spaces throughout the United States, and now in more than a dozen countries, as part of her Ripples of Kindness project. Her third book, Stumbling Toward Happiness, shares her notes of self-exploration.

Author’s website: https://songsofkat.com/

Bryan Rickert

is from Belleville, Illinois. He is the editor at The Living Senryu Anthology and co-editor of Failed Haiku Journal of Senryu. His writing has been published in a number of fine journals and anthologies. Fish Kite, his book of haiku and senryu, is available through Cyberwit Publishing. He is co-author with Peter Jastermsky of a collection of collaborative split sequences, Just Dust and Stone (Velvet Dusk Publishing, May 2021).