Strawberry haiku

That 200 seeds stud
the average strawberry
is a nitpicky fact.

Retirement, actually

A nail biter of a technical writer,

I asked dumb questions for a living.

Some folks write pulp fiction

I canned pulp fact, a manual laborer.

Like geology, each job deposited

a block in my resume, each

burying the next until the weight

squashed my shaley petrol soul.

Today I light a bonfire of my vanities

And manuals. I prance about adding fuel.

Layered papers that curl black

releasing smoke and dancing flames.

A wrinkly mess that crackles and ashens

all the logic and clicks, valves and bits,

and fuel lines, screens and splines,

or networks, tuner loops, and widgets.

Don’t look back in anger...

the buck has run out of steam.

I now live between every clock tick…

have time to peel a raisin, taste its skin,

and savor the fossil fruit within.