hai’ku – Page 6 – don't confuse the narrator

net value

In the moonlight
giant moths
gather on my bedroom wall

Actually, it’s the light of a street lamp, and therefore they only gather there until midnight and from 5:30am as the local council switch the lights off during the darkest part of the night to save energy.

And, of course, they aren’t quite moths. But they are near enough to have made me think about the poor creatures trapped in the net of the curtains and want to put the thought down here in case I can use it at some point in the future.

soundtrack

above the hum and buzz of insects
the fluttering chatter of songbirds; higher still,
the sour weep and bark of eagles

As I’ve said before (in the old post bluebirds and probably elsewhere) I’m not particularly fond of birds but they tend to crop up a lot in my poetry.
Continue reading “soundtrack”

summary

Yesterday, I wrote 229 words under the title summery II. Much of that post has been condensed into the following 14 words. Which is why this is titled summary.

Through the long hours
of the longest days,
the linden hums
with honeyed promises

spa’ku

We laze in jasmine-scented waters
while stainless steel appliances
fart us into relaxation.

As usual, it’s a fragment rather than a hai’ku. You can read more such pieces here on the blog, or check out my multimedia collection Poems from the Pueblo: haiku and assorted fragments. (The link takes you to the publisher’s video on Vimeo).

haiku for fools

Although I can’t find the date on the About Times Haiku page, I can only assume April 1st is the kigo (seasonal reference) that has justified this page of “Serendipitous Poetry from The New York Times“.

In addition to the 5-7-5 syllable “rule”, the NYT explain:

A proper haiku should also contain a word that indicates the season, or “kigo,” as well as a juxtaposition of verbal imagery, known as “kireji.”

They then admit:

That’s a lot harder to teach [as] an algorithm, though, so we just count syllables like most amateur haiku aficionados do.

It’s rather late in the day, so I’ll simply offer a picture of the weeds in my garden – a “juxtaposition of vernal imagery”, which is as close to a kireji as I can manage right now.