This was the last train
drops of
early summer rain
--Bernhard Kopf (Austria)
* * *
Morning coffee
with yesterday’s bread
a long rain
--Teichi Suzuki (Osaka)
* * *
The teapot whistles
and seventeen syllables
rise from a spring hut
--Heike Gewi (Norway)
* * *
A robin
drinks from a raindrop
I sip tea
--Caroline Gill (England)
* * *
Rainwater
a snail
on the ramp for the disabled
--Nelly Dobrinova (Bulgaria)
* * *
Composing a sonata:
sixteenth notes and raindrops
splash across my manuscript
--Alicia Hilton (Illinois)
* * *
A song of rain
from every gutter . ..
Lisbon’s light
--Romano Zeraschi (Italy)
* * *
The new cottage
fragrant as fingers touch
perfectly honed wood
--Hidehito Yasui (Osaka)
* * *
Setting sun--
the urge to be washed
by spring rain
--Rita Odeh (Israel)
* * *
After the evening rain
under apple tree blooms
a full moon
--Richard Jodoin (Quebec)
------------------------------
FROM THE NOTEBOOK
Our bodies’ wild sway
withered lilies
on Santa Clara’s float
--Anne Carly Abad (Philippines)
The haikuist rides a festival float decorated with Easter lilies. A graduate of Ateneo de Manila University, her poetry appears in literary reviews. Motoko Amatsuji goes shopping for flowers in Hyogo Prefecture.
Late cherry blossoms
the flower seller’s
Kyoto dialect
Vo Tuan Hoang Vy peers through a blue-tinted window in Vietnam. The color of the hydrangeas in Teiichi Suzuki’s garden reminds him of the hue of the blue paint selected by the 17th-century Dutch artist Jan Vermeer.
Blue rain
on the tiny pane
the rolling drops
* * *
Hydrangea
shrouded in the rain
Vermeer’s blue
T.D. Ginting and Hidehito Yasui imagine how a rolling river meets the sea.
The sea is waving
and the river is coming--
(be)longing each other
* * *
Rain drops on savanna
the blue Nile
the Mediterranean Sea
Mario Massimo Zontini sniffs at perfumed wind wafting through his hometown of Parma, Italy. Getting away from Tokyo to go camping with his grandchildren is heavenly, writes Hajimu Hirakita.
In spring rain
all drops are scented:
wisteria
* * *
Gardenias
on an old camping map
stars shine
Radostina A. Angelova tiptoes through a puddle in Bulgaria. Ikuyo Yoshimura observes the gentle, yet relentless hand of nature in Gifu Prefecture.
Bubbles in the pool
a pregnant woman
walking in the rain
* * *
Drop, drop, drop--
fresh leaves reflect in rainwater,
melting a sand castle
Abad’s grandmother prays for rain. Twelve-year-old Angelica McCammond is curious about her grandmother.
Grandma taps her fingers
is that a light drizzle
I finally hear?
* * *
Green mountains
the lump on
my granny’s back
From a distance, the landscape scene Valeria Barouch views resembles an indigo ink sketch--black trees in early morning with a smudge of gray smoke from a chimney winding through and blotting out the branches and everything else behind it. Ramona Linke reads a message penned by the wind.
Through black ink branches
the narrow trail rubbed out
by the cabin’s smoke
* * *
Mountain lake
the calligraphy
of the rain
Michael Corr zeroes in on a bird diving near the Olympic Peninsula in Washington State.
Iris white
fish hawk submerged
its pert splash
Maria Santomauro tends cottage garden flowers in New York. Her colorful haiku nestles a home in the romantic, unhurried pace of country life. Charlotte Digregorio wonders what to do with her mother’s garden in Illinois.
Among flowers
and butterflies
country cottage
* * *
After mother’s death . ..
rainwater nurtures
her violet azaleas
Heike Gewi fishes at a cabin in Norway. Craig Steele misses hunting in Pennsylvania. Rainwater cools Ramesh Anand in India. Ralf Broker lies back in bed in Poland.
Brand new car
parked by the old cabin . ..
shrouded in spring mist
* * *
Last look inside
collapsed hunting cabin--
dusty memories
* * *
Inside the hut
an old clay pot . ..
rainwater harvest
* * *
Anniversary
thinking about fixing
the cottage roof
Eager to view a solar eclipse, students ran to school earlier than usual on May 21, notes Satoru Kanematsu. Mario Massimo Zontini peers in the window of his favorite confectioner in Parma, Italy. He has a weakness for pastries called Baci di Dama, literally Lady’s Kisses.
Sun hiding
pupils and teachers
on the roof
* * *
Child’s dreams
in the confectioner’s shop:
lady’s kisses
---------------------------------------------------
The next issues of the Asahi Haikuist Network appear June 15 and 29. Readers are invited to send haiku about summer dreams on a postcard to David McMurray at the International University of Kagoshima, Sakanoue 8-34-1, Kagoshima, 891-0197, Japan, or by e-mail to (mcmurray@fka.att.ne.jp).
* * *
David McMurray has been writing the Asahi Haikuist Network column since April 1995, first for the Asahi Evening News. He is also the editor of OUTREACH, a bi-monthly column featuring international teachers in The Language Teacher of the Japan Association for Language Teacher (JALT).
McMurray is professor of intercultural studies at The International University of Kagoshima where he lectures on international haiku. At the Graduate School he supervises students who research haiku. He is a correspondent school teacher of Haiku in English for the Asahi Culture Center in Tokyo.
McMurray judges haiku contests organized by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Asahi Culture Center, Matsuyama City, and Seinan Jo Gakuin University.
McMurray's books include: "Canada Project in Kyushu" Vol. 1 (2006) - Vol. 7 (2011), Pukeko: Fukuoka; "Haiku in English as a Japanese Language" (2003), Pukeko: Kitakyushu; and "Hospital Departmental Operations - A Guide for Trustees and Managers," Canadian Hospital Association: Ottawa, Canada.
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