All afternoon he tries to recall what the argument was about. His drinking. Her waning sex drive. His meddling parents. Her hypochondria. An argument about everything is an argument about nothing, he thinks. As dusk approaches he hears the bedroom door open. “Want to play ping pong?” she asks. “Sure,” he mumbles. They stand across the table from one another. She serves first. He returns it. They keep this up for as long as they can, gentle, returnable shots. No one keeps score.

half moon
a scratch card
unscratched

Bob Lucky

is a regular contributor to haiku and tanka journals in the US, Europe, and Australia, whose work has been widely anthologized. His works in fiction, nonfiction, and poetry have appeared or are forthcoming in numerous international journals, including Flash, Rattle, Modern Haiku, KYSO Flash, The Prose-Poem Project, The Boston Literary Magazine, Haibun Today, and Contemporary Haibun Online (where he edits content).

Lucky’s chapbook of haibun, tanka prose, and prose poems, entitled Ethiopian Time (Red Bird Chapbooks, 2014) was an honorable mention in the Touchstone Book Awards. He now lives and works in Saudi Arabia.

More on the Web: By, About, and Beyond

⚡ Reflections on Writing, Editing, and the Status of Haibun: An Interview with Bob Lucky by Ray Rasmussen in Haibun Today (Volume 9, Number 3, September 2015)

⚡ Some Notes on Paradise, from Lucky’s chapbook Ethiopian Time

⚡ Interview with Bob Lucky, Author of Ethiopian Time by West African writer and blogger Geosi Gyasi in Geosi Reads: A World of Literary Pieces (22 May 2015)