I study the map and find a remote canyon in central Utah that looks promising. It’s a three-hour drive into the desert to reach the mouth of Fish Canyon. I park my car, lock it, hook my keys onto a carabiner and zipper them securely into a pocket. I swing my purple women’s pack onto my back, click the belt and the sternum strap, and make minor adjustments as I hop in place. Then I walk away from my car and into the canyon.

red rock
the slow erosion down
to me

I hike a few hours until I see a secure spot to make camp. I scurry down a steep ravine to a flat area so I will hear if anyone approaches while I’m sleeping. I set up my blue bison-shaped tent, and unravel my sleeping pad and -20°F bag. Gather firewood and make a fire ring. I cook dinner as dusk rapidly descends. The fire is a comfort but makes it harder for me to see my surroundings. Also easier for me to be seen. I pretend I’m not alone in case anyone is watching. “I’ll be in soon,” I call to my empty tent.

juniper and sage
the council of monsters
takes a vote

The next morning, I eat a quick breakfast, break down my tent and gear, load my backpack, and strap myself in. Now to get back up that ravine wall with a full pack. I steady my shifted center of mass while grabbing fistfuls of weeds for balance. If I fall, I could break an ankle and my situation would become tenuous quickly. What a good last-minute decision it was to tell a friend about this trip. Start a search if you don’t see me by Monday. Finally, I crest the ravine, and begin the hike out of the canyon.

broken roots
my inner animal
reborn

On the trail back, I pass groups of men carrying fishing poles. I guess there really is a lake up here. They look at me with a probing and steady gaze. I have suddenly become a character in their world.

apex predators
the cloud shadows
in a dry creek bed

Kat Lehmann

is a founding co-chief editor of whiptail: journal of the single-line poem. She is a winner of the 2024 Rattle Chapbook Prize and The Haiku Foundation’s 2020 Touchstone Award for Individual Poem. Kat served as a panelist for The Haiku Foundation Touchstone Distinguished Books Award (2021-2023), and her work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize, Best Small Fictions, and Best of the Net. A former research biochemist, Kat explores the grandiose within tiny haiku-genre poems, the storytelling possibilities of haibun, and experimentation with single- and multi-haiku forms. She lives in Connecticut with her family.

Author’s website: https://katlehmann.weebly.com/

More on the Web: By, About, and Beyond

⚡ Guests Kat Lehmann and Roberta Beary on “Experimental Haibun”: Episode 72 of The Poetry Space podcast by Katie Dozier and Timothy Green (2 August 2024)

⚡ MacQ Author Index lists links for two dozen of Kat’s haibun, plus two of her collaborative micro-poems with Bryan Rickert.