Five Haiku Questions:
Child
Who offers haiku
To whom when a child outlives
Her two parents
What child listens to
Elders without resistance
An opposite pole
Where did the story
slip loose now coated with ash
And altered by time
When will memories
Become blossoms like faces
Sunning together
Why can’t I hear you
In the haiku of ageless
Birdsongs and flowers
Five Haiku Questions:
Parent
Who offers haiku
To whom when parents outlive
Poetic license
What child listens to
Parents without pockets of
Skeptical laughter
Where turns the trusted
shoulder once shared, now she’s stood
Up to ache alone
When will self esteem
Be done with old songs, tuned to
Its fruitful future
Why can’t I hear you,
Bending to your voice, playing
And now replaying
[Note: these haiku were partly inspired by seeing the Three Wise Monkeys and the others in a series of panels in the Toshogu Temple in Nikko, Japan.
3 responses to “Haiku: Two Sets of Questions”
[…] These carved panels inspired a couple bursts of haiku. Read them here. […]
Hope you’ll publish a collection of your haiku someday.
Oh, Ann, you’re sweet. I was thinking I shouldn’t even have published these on my site, because they were pretty ‘seat-of-the-pants.’ So I appreciate the read and response! I’m generally bouncing between travel and ‘other’ writing. How’s your book coming along?