Winter Midnight

Leaf 264 – Reflections

 

Kawase Hasui - Rainy Night at Maekawa (1932)

I’m not sure when I wrote this haiku, but it was probably sometime around twenty or more years ago.

 

 

Somewhere between

sleet and hail –

winter midnight.

 

 

 

 

A Walk in the Woods

Leaf 263 – Reflections

 

Alexandra Buckle - Summer Tree Glow (2019)

Nature has a special way of awakening all the senses.

 

 

Walking in the wood,

cool earth beneath

my bare feet.

 

 

 

 

London Underground

Leaf 262 – Looking Back

 

Robert Ayton - London Underground (1961)

This is a poem which should be all too familiar for anyone who has ever waited for and experienced a train arriving on the tightly curved Central Line platforms at Bank on the London Underground.

 

 

Arcing into Bank –

with ear-shrilling echoes

the Underground sings.

 

 

 

 

Paths Untaken

Leaf 261 – Looking Back

 

Alexandra Buckle - Late Summer Woodland (2023)

With a respectful nod to Robert Frost, this is a haiku which harks back to thoughts of my hometown.

 

 

Weald filtering

dappled light

on paths untaken.

 

 

 

 

Howard Sochurek - Robert Frost in a field in Herefordshire (1957)

Rotemburo

Leaf 260 – Looking Back / Looking Forward

 

New Year, for us at least, is also the time of year for visiting ‘onsen,’ or hot springs, here in Japan. A ‘rotemburo’ is an outdoor bath.

 

 

Watching steam rise

while snow falls –

rotemburo.

 

 

 

 Photograph credit: EPA/Everett Kennedy Brown

Following Clouds

Leaf 259 – Looking Back / Looking Forward

 

Kanamori Yoshio - Lake Mountain (1970)

New Year has always been the time of year for visiting family. And for me, often, also a time of flying back and forth between Britain and Japan. Hence …

 

 

Following clouds

into the New Year.

 

 

 

 

New Year

Leaf 258 – Looking Back / Looking Forward

 

S.R. Badmin - Evening Snow

When all things begin anew …

 

 

NEW YEAR

 

Scent of pine needles

brushed from

the carpet.

 

 

 

 

Tim Chamberlain - Oshogatsu no Okazari (Shimekazari)