sakura mankai when there is no need for a translator
–Ivan Georgiev (Gottingen, Germany)
* * *
Kawasaki industrial zone
the guide says it’s Japan’s Mont Saint-Michel
as the sun goes down
–Junko Saeki (Tokyo)
* * *
disputed neighbourhood
the dry leaves gather
around the shared fence
–Hifsa Ashraf (Rawalpindi, Pakistan)
* * *
second day of spring
raked-up leaves
heaped by the wall
–Padraig O’Morain (Dublin, Ireland)
* * *
wind blows leaves
from us to them
the leaf blower roisters
–Pitt Buerken (Munster, Germany)
* * *
time out
facing away from the street
my neighbor’s gnome
–Bona M. Santos (Los Angeles, California)
* * *
boarding flight
to Mexico amidst
snowflakes
–Mary L. Leopkey (Texada Island, British Columbia)
* * *
entering the gay bar
a fish
out of water
–Mike Fainzilber (Rehovot, Israel)
* * *
my morning blackbird,
perched with his head cocked, cheeky–
‘Where’s my breakfast then?’
–Alan Marley (Canterbury, England)
* * *
coughing fits
the magpie in the tree
swoops
–Eleonore Nickolay (Vaires sur Marne, France)
——————————
FROM THE NOTEBOOK
——————————
the sun’s time to rise
your kids could face conscription
when they reach 18
–Junko Saeki (Tokyo)
Satisfied with the Upper House election results, the haikuist had worried that “the government went too far,” down the road to reinterpreting collective defense, noting that volunteer armies rely on “the poor and foreigners seeking citizenship.” Successful candidates had also raised other issues related to foreign tourists, international students, technical interns, permanent residents, diplomats and refugees.
In today’s column, haikuists confront overtourism. Masumi Orihara sought refuge at a shrine in Kanagawa Prefecture, but was surprised “to find so many visitors from all over the world.” Noting that many of the foreign men took off their caps and hats when they passed through the red torii, she wondered aloud if they were showing courtesy by acknowledging the religious environment.
A slight bow, and then
off with their summer caps–
Shinto shrine archway
Encountering holy animals that are protected as national monuments in Nara Park, Mirela Brailean likely held up her hands to show them she didn’t have any more crackers to share. Jackie Chou swam in a crowded school.
visit to Nara
not any place for hubris
in front of the deer
* * *
another gold koi…
weaving through crowds
college life
Murasaki Sagano recalled praying every day and observing “a good many events that captured the attention of tourists” when she lived in Kyoto near the thousand-year Kitano Tenmangu shrine.
life ongoing
through the straw rope ring–
summer exorcism
John S. Gilbertson peered over a boundary line. Melissa Dennison’s pet raked a miniature Zen landscape garden reminiscent of the one at Kyoto’s Ryoan-ji temple.
Kyoto garden
hides in the rising shadow
neighbor’s wall
* * *
in the bowl
a goldfish is
sculpting gravel
Resting on a mountain near Srinagar, Kashmir, Junaid Ahmed Ahangar nodded off to sleep while reading the line “wish you were here.”
kyoto’s drowsy countryside
i woke up in the middle of a dream
inside my friend’s postcard
Marie Derley attended a church wedding in Ath, Belgium.
Saturday
the whiteness of the brides
among the tourists
John Richard Stephens hopes Japanese readers will commiserate with this haiku, penned in Maui, Hawaii.
Summer heat–
lying down on a tatami mat
an exhausted guest
Thinking Joetsu, Niigata Prefecture, was far enough off the beaten path of tourists, Yutaka Kitajima tried to doze off on a hot day.
Intruding
into a light sleep…
the nightjar
An endless influx of international visitors, unrelenting rice prices and spiraling foreign exchange rates frustrate Sagano. The haikuist feels like Sisyphus: rolling a boulder up a mountain only for it to roll back down every time it neared the top, repeating this action for eternity.
First bonito
I am fed up with
Frugality
Ian Willey suggests that hardships don’t last forever, it is only “our limited capacity to perceive time that engraves them with a sense of permanence.” The rains and the mist on the mountains near his home in Kagawa Prefecture are transient, and “in the future these hills will all fade to nothing.”
mist moving
the mountains
Tourists hiking to Mount Fuji to mark the Aug. 11 Mountain Day holiday will first have to pay hefty entry fees to refill government coffers in Yamanashi and Shizuoka prefectures. Even foreign tourists pausing to take photos of the iconic mountain from bridges and other vantage points in Fuji city are accosted by eager city tourism promotion officers to follow heart-shaped walking routes around local shopping districts. Anticipating a crowded long weekend where she lives in Kyoto, don’t tell the tourists, but Anna Lenaker might return to a secret getaway for locals in the mountains near Shiiba, Miyazaki Prefecture.
Rice terraces stack
one on top of another–
mountainside farming
Vessislava Savova climbed dome-shaped Mount Vitosha in Sofia, Bulgaria.
close to the peak
let’s take a photo
ladybird
Carl Brennan was moved by Gustav Mahler’s Symphony No. 3, composed in 1896.
Green shadows, voices
drawing the mountain near
Mahler’s Third universe
Receiving an aspersion from the Black Sea coast, Stoianka Boianova could see the Balkan Mountains. Justice Joseph Prah felt uplifted in Accra, Ghana.
salty spray
breeze sprinkles the guests
beach wedding
* * *
Independence Day
the old road
lifts up a mountain
Jennifer Gurney’s son got married in the Colorado Rocky Mountains. Taking place in the backdrop of the wide outdoors, she noted how the small wedding party “was truly spectacular.” David Cox took one last look at the mother of waters, affectionately named Tahoma by the Puyallup indigenous peoples in the Pacific Northwest.
a quarter
of the wedding guests
bride and grooms’ parents
* * *
slowly–
a snowflake drips
down Mount Rainier
Tourists to the Himalayas complain that the iconic mountain range is disappearing in haze. Haikuists might try capturing its final moments in a haiku or a postcard, because the once scintillating views are now largely limited to online images at Flickr. The air pollution is caused by smoke particles from fires and dust from the polluted province of Gandaki in Nepal, the state of Uttarakhand in India and Peshawar in Pakistan. Tejendra Sherchan described his nightmare in Kathmandu, Nepal.
in my dream
I’m to sweep a floor
never-ending dirt
Cloud-viewing, Sherchan stretched a common metaphor about a long-necked flightless bird avoiding problems by sticking its head in sand.
dusk tinted sky
clouds form an ostrich
its vanishing neck
In Athens, Greece, Foteini Georgakopoulou responded to this Zen question: Around the summit I only see pines and a thatched hut set in their shade where does that gust of wind come from?
That wind
Out of nowhere stirred
The darkness in the garden
Fatma Zohra Habis looked for an open space in Algiers, Algeria. Kavita Ratna shouldered her way to an open space on a crowded dance floor in Bangalore, India.
weekend picnic
at the local park
I search for blue sky
* * *
spaghetti straps
sway to the beat…
young night
To live peacefully and away from the multitude, Luciana Moretto suggests we let gardens and fields lie fallow. Left uncultivated the soil will recover its fertility. The haikuist was inspired by reading Epicurus (341-270 BCE), a Greek philosopher who tended a simple garden with a circle of friends. He inferred that sustainability allows for a tolerable level of security against oppressive neighbors.
fallow fields
“Live Hidden”
grape hyacinths
Seated on a zabuton cushion in front of his television set, Stephens got so excited he was ready to throw it.
salt in the air
fists on the clay–
tension rises
Watching a press conference, Helen Buckingham unpacked this line of events: trumpaddvanceattackgratetv
Taking a break is a necessary virtue, especially during these dark times we live in. Peggy Pilkey turned off her television set in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, because she “can’t bear to watch or listen to the televised headline news any longer.” Compared to the brighter city lights of neighboring Halifax, her quieter town is sometimes referred to as the “Darkside.” The haikuist enjoys reading submissions from “writers of haiku and senryu around the world who still manage to find joy in nature, and who share their observations on life.”
hyacinths
die with dignity–
among reborn poppies
The Bulgarian haikuist, Boryana Boteva, might be satisfied living by the Aegean Sea.
simplicity
of a small piece of land
the ocean’s caress
Sagano found a quiet place in Tokyo to leaf through the eighth century anthology of Japanese poetry, “Collection of Ten Thousand Leaves.”
White bellflowers
reading Manyoshu
subtle light
In Zagreb, Croatia, Tomislav Maretic regularly takes his puppy for a walk in a neighborhood where the gardens are full of roses, peonies and other flowers. He admits he will pick “just one flower here and there… and soon the vase on my table will overflow with a lavish mix of blossoms!” Slobodan Pupovac was satisfied by one fragrant bloom.
a walk at night–
from every garden one flower–
a bouquet on the table
* * *
early morning
the smell of the neighbor’s rose
in my room
Robin Rich closed the windows of his home in Brighton, England.
in the night
vandals or the wind
blossom on the floor
Nonplussed by a hoard of passersby in Nagoya, Satoru Kanematsu deadheaded garden roses which reached their peak in July. He penned this haiku in anticipation of the deep yellow and red autumn roses that he hopes will color his September.
Old actress
dreams of a comeback
withered rose
Maija Haavisto identified Bulgaria as “the country of roses.”
rosebuds open like
clementines: only missing
juice drips on my chin
Gordana Vlasic stored his rubbers in case he needs them next year in Oroslavje, Croatia.
the first primroses
my winter boots
still unworn
Marley penned a haiku about a bouquet of white roses. During the War of the Roses, soldiers wearing the white rose of York battled contenders wearing the red rose of Lancaster for control of the English throne from May 22, 1455, to June 16, 1487.
roses he offered
in his rough, blood-beaded hands–
his love, unspoken…
David Cox visited a bastion fort in George Town, Malaysia, built by the British East India Company in the late 18th century.
Wild chickens
roaming Fort Cornwallis–
cocksure state of mind
Dennison was amazed to see hundreds of revelers still lingering near her home.
butterflies
on the butterfly bush
party like it’s 4th of july
Not to be confused with “wah,” the Japanese concept of living in peaceful harmony, John Zheng’s neighbor at the end of his street in Bena, Mississippi, wails into a telephone asking for emergency assistance once or twice a week.
meandering
through loud firecrackers
a wambulance
—————————————————————————————————
Revive your travel memories at http://www.asahi.com/ajw/special/haiku/. The next issues of the Asahi Haikuist Network appear Aug. 15 and 29. Readers are invited to send haiku about whether war and summer will ever end 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
David McMurray has been writing the Asahi Haikuist Network column since April 1995, first for the Asahi Evening News. He is on the editorial board of the Red Moon Anthology of English-Language Haiku, columnist for the Haiku International Association, and is editor of Teaching Assistance, a column in The Language Teacher of the Japan Association for Language Teaching (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 International University of Kagoshima, Ito En Oi Ocha, Asahi Culture Center, Matsuyama City, Polish Haiku Association, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Seinan Jo Gakuin University, and Only One Tree.
McMurray’s award-winning books include: “Teaching and Learning Haiku in English” (2022); “Only One Tree Haiku, Music & Metaphor” (2015); “Canada Project Collected Essays & Poems” Vols. 1-8 (2013); and “Haiku in English as a Japanese Language” (2003).
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