Crushed Lavender

Leaf 371 – Reflections

 

Edvard Munch - Summer Night, Inger on the Shore (1889)

Sometimes the simplest memories are often the most evocative.

 

 

End of the walk –

her fingers scented

with crushed lavender.

 

 

 

Sarah Ross-Thompson - West Coast of Scotland

This haiku was originally written and posted on Bluesky in response to a #haikufeels writing prompt: 'crush.'

Winter Moon

Leaf 370 – Reflections

 

Katja Lang - Road to E (2022)

No road is lonelier than the road through a deep winter night.

 

 

A puddle

fracturing underfoot

– winter moon.

 

  

This haiku was originally written and posted on Bluesky in response to a #dailyhaikuprompt: 'winter moon.'

Cannon Beach

Leaf 369 – Looking Back

 

Growing up in the 1980s, I remember going to see the film, ‘The Goonies’ (1985) when it first came out at the cinema. I was exactly the right age to see this movie at the time – the same age as Mikey and his friends, and so the film has been one of my firm favourites ever since. Fast forward several decades to 2012. Where I found myself working in Portland, Oregon, and so I decided to make a pilgrimage to Astoria and Cannon Beach, where I was impressed by the sheer power of the ocean. A mini-Goonies adventure all of my own!

 

 

Relentless roar –

roller upon roller

breaking at Cannon Beach.

 

 

 

This haiku was originally written and posted on Bluesky in response to a #vssdaily writing prompt: 'roller.'

Photographs by Tim Chamberlain

My Last Coin

Leaf 368 – Reflections

 

True story …

 

 

My last coin

rolls under the

vending machine.

 

 

 

This haiku was originally written and posted on Bluesky in response to a #dailyhaikuprompt: 'lost.'

Photographs by Tim Chamberlain

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).