Housing Bust Haiku

I.


Magnolia trees
blossom
by boarded-up houses.

Fresh, new, green grass
rises
around abandoned play sets.

Packing what they can,
homeowners
move into their cars.


II.


“Free-free-free-market,”
Alan Greenspan calls
like a cardinal.

Slate-backed bankers
gather like sparrows
around scattered crumbs.

Like a house finch singing
on a high branch,
the president praises himself.


III.


A country jumps into
a still pond.
The sound of petroleum!