Fresh Tea

Leaf 367 – Reflections

 

Leah Gardner - Tea

This poem was originally written and posted on Bluesky in response to a #dailyhaikuprompt to write a haiku using the words: ‘withering’ and ‘tea.’ Like almost all people from Britain, tea has always been one of my favourite drinks – but not just the usual black tea with milk preferred by many in the UK, from an early age I also liked Earl Grey, Assam, Orange Pekoe, and Lapsang Souchong. Jasmine Pearl has always been a favourite of mine too. I’m not sure when I first tried green tea, but I do remember the first time I tried Houjicha in Japan, Puer in China, and Masala Chai in India (see also, Leaf 288). I think one of the things I like most about tea-drinking is the great variety in both taste and aroma. To my mind, at least, there really is nothing more relaxing than a nice cup of tea.

 

 

Scenting withered grass –

steam rises from

fresh green tea.

 

 

 

Leah Gardner - Tea and Books

Rhyming Haiku?

Leaf 366 – Senryu (or witty, tom-foolery)

 

Last autumn I was gifted three bottles of red wine by a family member who had been given them by their old boss. Their boss was a doctor who was retiring, and when shutting down his practice, he’d re-discovered the bottles of wine which he’d been gifted by some of his grateful patients over the years. He wasn’t sure when, but some of them had probably been given to him many, many years prior. The label was missing from one, another looked as though it might not be too old, but the third had a distinctly dried-out and brittle label which was almost detached – held in place only by a rubber band! – This bottle, so the label attested, was a Château Gombaude-Guillot Pomerol, 2001. Almost twenty-five years old!

We had no idea what conditions the bottles had been kept in. For all we knew they’d been successively exposed to the huge seasonal swings in temperature and humidity which afflict and overwhelm Japan each summer and winter over the course of the last two decades or thereabouts. So it was with some trepidation that I fished out my corkscrew from its kitchen drawer.

The first, unlabelled bottle of wine was undrinkable. It quickly disappeared down the plughole of the sink, followed by the sludge which had accrued at the bottom of the bottle. But, the Château Gombaude-Guillot Pomerol, 2001! – Well, contrary to expectations, it was really rather good. A splash of it helped to spice up a very delicious spaghetti bolognese and the rest of it was imbibed with suitable alacrity. It was only after opening it and discovering that it was indeed drinkable that a little research revealed that a bottle of this vineyard and vintage retails today for around $55! – and so the last few glasses were downed heartily with an honourable salute to the good doctor and his continuing health; may he have a long and happy retirement!

In addition, the following aberration of a haiku – or rather, a somewhat unconventional senryu – was penned after a couple of glasses of this very delicious Pomerol. With a somewhat nostalgic sense of amusement, it harks back to memories of many a local character I’ve met over the years, propping up the bar in the pubs of Cornwall. Every small village seems to have at least one such character, usually an old salt with a silver tongue!

This verse was originally posted on Bluesky, in response to a #haikufeels writing prompt, with the following explanatory prescript:

 

Somewhat shockingly, this one breaks a rule about NEVER writing haiku that rhyme. But if I blame the two very delicious glasses of red wine which I've just drunk a little too quickly this evening, maybe just this once we can let this one slip by unnoticed?  ... Cheers!

 

There he goes again!

 

For a pint of beer –

spinning another yarn

the grockles love to hear.

 

Dod Procter - Tolcarne Inn (1935)

Photographs by Tim Chamberlain

Red Summer Sun

Leaf 365 – Reflection

 

This poem consciously emulates a haiku by Bashō (see below). But it also attempts to connect Bashō’s poem to our own life here in modern day Tokyo. From our balcony we can see Mount Fuji to the west. Throughout the course of the year, I like to watch the wandering progress of the setting sun as it moves along the mountain ridge first one way and then heading back again. The late summer and early autumn sunsets are always the most spectacular, and they always seem to coincide with the setting sun’s alignment directly behind Mount Fuji. In my mind, it’s as if I’m seeing summer packing up and departing Tokyo for the winter, to spend the cold season of each year’s end in some other, warmer place somewhere beyond Mount Fuji. (As always, I’m not sure how well my Japanese version works; but both versions are 5-7-5).

 

富士山や   赤々の暮れ   秋の風

ふじさんや | あかあかのくれ | あきのかぜ

Mount Fuji | the crimson summer dusk | autumn wind

 

 

A last red sunset –

summer slips past Mount Fuji

with the autumn wind.

Or:

On the autumn wind –

summer’s last warm glow, setting 

behind Mount Fuji.

 

 

Tsukioka Kogyo - Barley Field at Sunrise (c.1900-1910)

 

Bashō’s haiku:

あかあかと日はつれなくも秋の風

 

     The sun bright red,

Relentlessly hot, –

     But the wind is of autumn.

(translated by R.H. Blyth)

 

 

Tsukioka Kogyo - Barley Field (c.1900)

Top photograph by Tim Chamberlain (2024).

Living Room

Leaf 364 – Art Inspired

 

Caroline Johnson - The Living Room at La Mardelle, Brittany

This painting by Caroline Johnson, ‘The Living Room at La Mardelle, Brittany,’ reminds me of several comfortable abodes I’ve known over the years – my own, as well as those of family and friends.

 

 

A clock ticks –

in comfortable

silence.

 

 

 

Feathered Flotilla

Leaf 363 – Art Inspired

 

Print by Sue Welfare

This print by Sue Welfare echoes many a similar scene which I’ve witnessed at the Cornish fishing port of Newlyn. You can almost hear the chaotic, jubilant cries of the seagulls mobbing the small boat as it motors homeward.

 

 

Approaching the narrows –

a feathered flotilla follows

the fishing boat in.

 

 

 

River Twilight

Leaf 362 – Art Inspired

 

Kawase Hasui, ‘Twilight at Kiba Lumber Yard’ (c.1920)

This wonderfully evocative Shin-hanga print by Kawase Hasui, ‘Twilight at Kiba Lumber Yard’ (c.1920), reminds me of many a river scene I’ve encountered here in different parts of Japan. It also reminds me of similar scenes among the muddy inlets along London’s tidal Thames. Captured perfectly in this particular print, I can feel that magical sense of time which only becomes perceptible at certain points at the start and close of day, when the world (and time with it) seems stilled. Almost as though one can reach out and touch the faraway sky, I suppose it has something to do with the riverine acoustics, when the wind drops and the very essence of the outdoors seems to echo deep within.

 

 

Sun dips

in evening deeps,

river stilled.

 

 

 

This haiku was originally written and posted on Bluesky.

Inner Sanctum

Leaf 361 – Reflections

 

To my mind at least, magnolia trees bursting into bloom herald the true onset of Spring each year. The magnolia in the two accompanying photographs is in Hampstead, near Keats Grove. Curiously, due to their longevity as a species, magnolia trees are pollinated by insects, such as beetles, rather than bees.

 

 

An ant in its

inner sanctum

– flowering magnolia.

This poem was originally written and posted on Bluesky in response to a #haikuchallenge writing prompt: sanctum.

Photographs by Tim Chamberlain