Frogpond

Volume 44:2 Spring/Summer 2021

 

Frogpond

Volume 44 : 2 Spring / Summer 2021

Frogpond Volume 44 : 2

Editor-in-Chief Tom Sacramona

Haiku and Senryu Editor Brad Bennett
Haibun Editor Judson Evans
Linked Verse Editors Mary Stevens
Alan S. Bridges
Layout Artist Ignatius Fay
Contributing Layout Artist Lisa Maccioli
Cover Artist Scott Murphy
Contributing Artist Jamie A. Muth
Book Reviewers Kristen Lindquist
Laurie D. Morrissey
Randy Brooks
Bruce Ross
Contributing Book Reviewers Robert Epstein
Tom Clausen
Shelley Baker-Gard

ISSN 8755-156X
Listed in the MLA International Bibliography, Humanities International
Complete, and Poets & Writers.
© 2021 by the Haiku Society of America, Inc.
All prior copyrights are retained by contributors. Full rights
revert to contributors upon publication in Frogpond. The Haiku
Society of America, its officers, and the Frogpond editors assume
no responsibility for the views of any contributors whose work
appears in the journal, nor for research errors, infringement
of copyright, or failure to make proper acknowledgment of
previously-published material.
 

Contents
Best of Issue Frogpond Award 1

Haiku and Senryu 3

Remembering vincent tripi (1941–2020) 56

Finding Our Way 58

Renku 60

Haibun 66

Linked Verse 81

Essays 90

Everything You Always Wanted To Know 90

About Persimmons by Charles Trumbull

The Heft of Haiku by Michael Dylan Welch 109

Contests 116

2021 Nicholas A. Virgilio Competition 116

Book Reviews 121

Author Index 150

HSA Membership and Frogpond Submissions 157

HSA Officers and Regional Coordinators 158

 HSA Patrons
Our thanks to all those who made gifts beyond their
memberships to support the HSA and its work.

Sponsors / Gifts of more than $100

Donna M Bauerly • Roberta Beary • Teresa Carns • Bruce Feingold
Mark Forrester • Howard Lee Kilby • Edward Kosiewicz • Connie Meester
Helen Ogden • Debbie Olson • James A Paulson • Jamie Phelps • Mike Rehling
Michael Roach • John Stevenson • Steve Tabb • Jamie Wimberly

Donors / Gifts of more than $50

Mimi Ahern • Francine Banwarth • Elizabeth Black • John Budan • Wanda Cook
Rise Daniels • Maria Theresa Dimacali • Christine Eales • Robert M Gilliland
Henry Kreuter • James Laurila • Eric Leventhal-Arthen • Patricia Machmiller
Kathleen MacQueen • Carole MacRury • Jeannie F Martin • Bona McKinney
Patricia Nolan • Renée Owen • Christa Pandey • Marian M Poe • Rich Rosen
Leigh Siderhurst • Kath Abela Wilson

Friends / Gifts of more than $35

Linda Ahrens • Frederick Andrle • Orlino Baldonado • Becky Barnhart
Stuart Bartow • John Candelaria • Jeri “Imaginishi” Crippen • David Kāwika Eyre
Andy Felong • William Scott Galasso • Gregory Good • Joan Iverson Goswell
Steven Greene • Maureen Haggerty • Tom Hahney • Carolyn Hall
Merle D. Hinchee • Judith Hishikawa • Mark Hurtubise • Liga Jahnke
Bill & Joann Klontz • Antoinette Libro • Janis Lukstein • Doris Lynch
Curtis Manley • William Maxwell • Marci McGill • Kati Mohr • Paula Moore
Lenard D. Moore • Tom Painting • Susan Powers • Sandi Pray • CJ Prince
Patricia Prine • Edward J. Rielly • Joseph Robello • Michele Root-Bernstein
Ce Rosenow • Dave Russo • Autumn Starr O’Brien • Carmen Sterba
Debbie Strange • Johnye Strickland • Angela Terry • Edward Tick • Ian Turner
Mona Van • Marilyn A Walker • Jason Scott Wallace • Lew Watts
Christine Wenk-Harrison • Dale Wisely • Frank Yanni • Rich Youmans

In Memoriam
John Budan in memory of Lawrence Ferlinghetti
Diane Skrivseth in loving memory of Donald Skrivseth
Harriet Levine and Jeanne Niccolls in honor of Harold G. Henderson to support
the HSA Haiku Award Contest and in loving memory of Anita Virgil
  1

Best of Issue Frogpond Award

Voted best haiku in Frogpond Volume 44 : 1
by the HSA Executive Committee

tide line . . .
every step taken
taken back

Michele Root-Bernstein
 3

Haiku and Senryu

dewy morning—
orb weaver webs spangled between
the telephone lines

Wally Swist

glitch we follow the cows

Susan Beth Furst

she takes a spin

on her birthday bike
forsythia

Hannah Mahoney

late snowfall—
the discountenancing
of a gardener

Dan Schwerin
4 Frogpond 44:2

vaccine day
spring birdsong
a shot in the arm

Marilyn Ashbaugh

what I mean to say going along with autocomplete

Mary Stevens

ifs, ands, buts, March wind

Christopher Patchel

keeping us
in our thoughts
steady rain

Gary Hotham
 Haiku and Senryu 5

dusty stairs
I clean my shadow
step by step

Mohammad Azim Khan

ebb tide
crab hole after crab hole
sighs

Lorin Ford

at
the
base
of
a
redwood
lessons
on
perspective

GRIX

nurse log
doing nothing
starts to mushroom

Dan Schwerin
6 Frogpond 44:2

late autumn rain

my knee brings back
a hockey game

Martin Duguay

winter crow
holding half
a conversation

Anne Elise Burgevin

waxing one more time grandfather’s moon

Srinivas S

jockeying
the horse weathervane
that loud wren

Barbara Ungar
 Haiku and Senryu 7

beach grasses
stretching wind
into shadow

Michele Root-Bernstein

the bottle cap

jumps a checker
summer evening

Tom Bierovic

lap swim—
starting a count
I will likely lose

David Cashman

in all that mud a tender morsel slack tide

Glenn G. Coats
8 Frogpond 44:2

as summer turns yellow green tomatoes

Bisshie

fingernail moon
the feeble plucking
of guitar strings

Elisa Bobbiesi

ice-coated road—
the car’s slow waltz
round . . . and round

Patricia J. Machmiller

closing time the drummer rushes the off beat

Derek Sprecksel
 Haiku and Senryu 9

new moon
the slight drawl
in his twang

Erin Castaldi

dawn . . .
finding first position at
the piano keys

Elliot Nicely

spider web
catches barn dust
cracked windshield

Jerry Levy

bayou breakfast
part of the jambalaya
still moving

Frank Higgins
10 Frogpond 44:2

my name in print
the stone carver and I
both smile

Lee Giesecke

March 15th—
still needing the quilt
head to feet

Lenard D. Moore

first bloom
and the freedom
not to

Aaron Barry

spring zephyr
a bench inscribed
“She Liked To Play”

Carolyn Hall
 Haiku and Senryu 11

home office
my coworker
mends her web

Madelaine Caritas Longman

spring break
a day moon too high
to spike

Scott Mason

Rust Belt town

only its bars
still open

John J. Dunphy

every spring the impossibility of opening up

Adam T. Bogar
12 Frogpond 44:2

between Bach and birdsong blossom rain

Rick Tarquinio

the way we were

here and there the absence
of snow

James Schlett

my careless remark
yesterday’s clouds
in the swollen river

Polona Oblak

first warm day

the conspicuous arrival
of one ant

Jim Laurila
 Haiku and Senryu 13

spring picnic
rolling up a blanket
of afternoon sun

Richard L. Matta

moonlight
the acrobatics
of a white cat

Laurie Greer

winter rain—
the escape key
on my computer

Sam Bateman

introverts get lonely too redwood sorrel

Carolyn Hall
14 Frogpond 44:2

the flash
of a junco’s tail
winter solstice

Dan Curtis

hey batta batta spring

Nicholas Mathisen

his pacemaker
tune up
chamber music

Barbara Moore

opening day
the little leaguer’s
snaggle-tooth grin

Ellen Compton
 Haiku and Senryu 15

downsizing . . .
still unable to pitch
their pinch pots

Anna Eklund-Cheong

crowded windowsill
the green uncurling
of unlabelled seeds

Amanda Bell

anatomy lab
my future wife
dissects a stranger

Joseph Robello

(living in) the buoyancy

of (my pandemic) moods . . .
sea salt (bubble) bath

Julie Bloss Kelsey

16 Frogpond 44:2

gardening
only one tick
this time

Bruce Ross

spring sun—
the glistening
of a stretch mark

Makarios Tabor

zero to sixty zucchini

Michele L. Harvey

a boy measuring his banana

against a crescent moon
story time

Adesokan Babatunde Waliyullah

 Haiku and Senryu 17

every day
a school day
lesser redpolls

Katrina Shepherd

sunlight
through the chrysalis
my daughter’s laughter

Joshua Gage

phrasing answers as questions on the wrong game shows

Nathanael Tico

in the center
of my Venn diagram
withered chrysanthemum

Fay Aoyagi
18 Frogpond 44:2

the moth the moment I open my mouth

Bob Lucky

starry night
unclasping
the little black dress

Jessica Malone Latham

hot and humid

my apology clings
to my tongue

Nika

planting seeds
with the tap
of a space bar

Victor Ortiz
 Haiku and Senryu 19

in the crook
of old oak boughs—
a magpie bathes

Mary White

cold water the leeks in my hands sharing sand

Jo Balistreri

cobblestone streets
an American stumbles
over the menu

Mark Dailey

cycling the long way home leafswirl

Roberta Beary
20 Frogpond 44:2

oolong . . .
how deep
this autumn

Lori A Minor

pond at dawn frogsplaining

Roberta Beach Jacobson

sleeping on the laptop the lapcat

Helen Ogden

sunset
a puppy whines
at his shadow

David He
 Haiku and Senryu 21

insurrection
the white stain
of winter salt

Matthew Caretti

tent city
an eviction notice
on a concrete wall

Roland Packer

chain reaction
the guard dog takes it
as far as it goes

Tom Painting

my grandson
practices clapping
inauguration day

Bruce H. Feingold
22 Frogpond 44:2

spring breeze
a feeling of wonder
becomes a crocus

George Swede

All those distant planets—

no luck keeping alive
the indoor plants

Rebecca Lilly

taped
to his teapot
this leaks

Denise Fontaine-Pincince

it’s there
on the tip of my tongue
scrambled eggs

Carly Siegel Thorp

 Haiku and Senryu 23

his best stories

told the way
they never happened

David Watts

forest clearing
shadows stir
at the meadow’s edge

Jay Friedenberg

dog sniffing grass

the search
for deeper meaning

Mona Van

three small dots

he expects me to understand
his silence

Arvinder Kaur
24 Frogpond 44:2

winter twilight—
the stag’s antlers
turning silver

Ruth Holzer

midnight oil
not knowing where to start
to stop burning

Mike Gallagher

early morning field

each wildflower a lantern
of sunlit dew

Michael Ketchek

a million origin stories

sneakers
over a power line

Jacob Blumner
 Haiku and Senryu 25

sunset colouring outside the lines of geese

Jacquie Pearce

winter fragment
the green anole’s
shriveled body

Alex Fyffe

a traffic jam
getting home
coastal sunset

Olivier Schopfer

salt marsh
a white pillar
of egret

Dana Grover
26 Frogpond 44:2

burnt leaves
in the water trough
the blood-red moon

Mark Miller

aftermath . . .
all the flyers
of the missing

Dan Burt

deep gully—
the stream
finds a way out

Gregory Piko

teasle down
all along the train tracks
the finch’s song

Julie Mellor
 Haiku and Senryu 27

kingfisher
the river plunges
into itself

Debbie Strange

winter garden
trying to remember
their names

Sondra J. Byrnes

midsummer
lost in the butterfly
lost in the flower

Kristen Lindquist

desert rain
letting the day
sink in

Peter Jastermsky
28 Frogpond 44:2

surviving cancer—
the purple crocus
beside my foot

Meik Blöttenberger

a half moon
breaches the crest of the bay
beached jellies

Samantha Renda

boom town
a dumpster diver’s
afternoon visit

Mike Montreuil

dropping coins
on his sleeping bag
winter rain

Matt Quinn
 Haiku and Senryu 29

blurred skyline . . .
snowflakes melt
on my contacts

Jamie A. Muth

scarred moon
I love who I am
with you

Vandana Parashar

spring begins
I give my worries
wings

Beverly Acuff Momoi

daylight saving
a kite
stuck in a tree

David Grayson
30 Frogpond 44:2

skyscrapers
my collar turned up
to the cold

Joe McKeon

spring twilight—
the basketball’s feel
on my fingertips

Barry George

comfort food
circling the table
a Beatles LP

Deb Koen

muting
my microphone—
acid reflux

Stella Pierides
 Haiku and Senryu 31

the artichoke
shrinks leaf by leaf
dinner stories

Agnes Eva Savich

chilly night
the tinkling sounds
of an elephant’s bell

Hemapriya Chellappan

old flame
leaving an impression
in the wax

Jayne Miller

all day rain

the stone buddha
rests its shadow

Barrie Levine
32 Frogpond 44:2

snowmelt
shapes sharpen
into themselves

Michael Baeyens

crop circle a scar in his stubble

Tanya McDonald

deep winter sky

a spoonful of stardust
in my coffee

Edward Cody Huddleston

good health too a pre-existing condition

Marsh Muirhead
 Haiku and Senryu 33

carillon bells
a ring of wheelchairs
around the sound

Sandi Pray

feeling the burn

my reflection
in the gym window

Tia Haynes

empty storefronts
the depth
of autumn leaves

Lori Zajkowski

pay raise
or
becomes and

Pat Davis
34 Frogpond 44:2

autumn dusk
another death
of someone my age

Angela Terry

rolling thunder
roadies load
the amplifiers

John Stevenson

late September—
all that glitters
is goldenrod

John S. O’Connor

halving the night

the train’s whistle

Alan S. Bridges
 Haiku and Senryu 35

steeping tea—
the changing scent
of steam

Janice Doppler

not long
for this world
clouds

Tom Clausen

leap day icing on the lake

LeRoy Gorman

pale face
we hand you the first snowdrop
over your broken pelvis

Ruth Yarrow
36 Frogpond 44:2

I give her a start

beginning of fall

Elmedin Kadric

crossword puzzle
wishing i didn’t know
enola gay

Gregory Longenecker

blood moon—
the lamplit edge
of grandpa’s tomb

Taofeek Ayeyemi

standing under
stars
not understanding

Warren Decker
 Haiku and Senryu 37

cold snap privilege to have power

kjmunro

leap day
the neighbor’s newspaper
on our porch

George Skane

laid off—
my ass sinks into
the (c)ouch

Susan Burch

a curtain
tickles my elbow
spring

Linda McCarthy Schick

38 Frogpond 44:2

dove song
I unlace
muddy boots

Gideon Young

lighting the match

that lights the fire
morning tea

Bryan Rickert

heavy rain . . .
hearing the marsh
in every step

Tony Williams

spring mountain
my woolen hat
starts to unravel

Tim Murphy
 Haiku and Senryu 39

silver
flute

I
lift
a
mirror

to
the
moon

Lee Gurga

valentine’s day the cellist leans into his melody

Silk

March wind
the regrets
I don’t yet have

Maggie Roycraft

a bee works
across hydrangea blossoms
another empty

Jon Hare
40 Frogpond 44:2

stilettos in snow . . .
before my sense of
sensibility

Cynthia Cechota

parallel
worlds
the
stack
by
my
bed

Annette Makino

a dozen plots away the gravedigger waits

Greg Schwartz

cold winter night

the cat repositions
me

Paul Hendricks
 Haiku and Senryu 41

pale haze
around the night light
pillow talk

Maxianne Berger

faded red barns

the perfect shades
of old

Mary Weidensaul

foreclosure—
the long shadow
of a daddy long-legs

Antoinette Cheung

reeds edging the marsh blackbirds in bloom

Ferris Gilli
42 Frogpond 44:2

just enough heat

to draw the ants
from the grout lines

Paul Chambers

his hand comes to rest

where her breast used to be
nesting doves

Julie Schwerin

spring rain
the dimple
in her chin

Sharon Rhutasel-Jones

the back lane purple

with squashed blackberries—
summer storm

Rhys Owain Williams

 Haiku and Senryu 43

morning gust
exchanging breath
with the night jasmine

Manoj Sharma

so above us
so full of itself
the moon

Robert Moyer

jogging through a heatwave pink frangipanis

Kieran O’Connor

millpond shower
the perfect tense in
every drop

Michael Henry Lee

44 Frogpond 44:2

summer triangle
satellites criss-crossing
yesteryear’s stars

Terri L. French

curve of her ribs

twelve crescent moons
rise with each breath

Kat Lehmann

simpler living
raising chickens for eggs
and company

Robert Piotrowski

snow upon snow

chili reheats
on the stove

Ben Gaa
 Haiku and Senryu 45

after fairy tales the never endings

Francine Banwarth

spring mud
the hyphen
before American

Fay Aoyagi

he fends off her questions

she fends off his hands

Lorraine A. Padden

wave turning
over–turning
to whiteness

David Kāwika Eyre

46 Frogpond 44:2

river stroll . . .
the clouds tinged
with salmon

Chen-ou Liu

less and less light

larches step out
of the woods

Julie Schwerin

belly-down
staring into the stream
of consciousness

Laurie D. Morrissey

morning crescent
rising from the glen
the scent of wild fennel

Chuck Brickley
 Haiku and Senryu 47

forest walks another part of me

Agus Maulana Sunjaya

on a scrap
of white birch
a few lines

Jeffrey Ferrara

winter deer
half-glimpsed
in the words

Michele Root-Bernstein

end of day
a young girl sings
the herd back home

Kevin Valentine
48 Frogpond 44:2

spring thaw
a shaft of sunlight
on her sneer

Lew Watts

barefoot
the puppy’s little boy
puddles home

Robert Witmer

the rank smell

of an unseen deer—
rutting season rain

Brent Partridge

dining with an ex—

the empty salt-shaker
filled with moonlight

Pragya Vishnoi
 Haiku and Senryu 49

gray winter sky

nothing we did not
already know

Scott Wiggerman

each step
flint for the chemo
cool sand

Bob Redmond

family farm . . .
eyeing the scarecrow
eyeing us

Hifsa Ashraf

honeysuckle
and any moment
hummingbird

Robert Gilliland
50 Frogpond 44:2

the mating cries

of a roaming fox
this net of stars

Renée Owen

bend of the river

a root tangle
releases a stone

Seren Fargo

scent of cedar lake fishing in a new canoe

Jacob Salzer

solo oboe
the length of the arroyo
fresh coyote tracks

Keith Polette
 Haiku and Senryu 51

arrowroot
being heartbroken
grows on you

M. R. Defibaugh

creek dipping
the dimples
of water striders

Jeff Hoagland

mistflower

the
whisper

I
wished
for

Lee Gurga
52 Frogpond 44:2

calf umbilical
dawn stretches thin
across the frost

Tyler McIntosh

all the colours of the stubble field geese on the wind

John Barlow

aging in place
reading obituaries before
the sports page

Edward J. Rielly

spring snow
the cloud life
of a left-out trike

Mike White
 Haiku and Senryu 53

nightfall
the runaway unfolds
her crayon map

John McManus

scratching off
the lottery ticket
melting snow

Jennifer Hambrick

my first time
listening to an ambulance
from inside

William Hart

children’s memorial grove—

the daffodils bloom here
first

Robert Epstein
54 Frogpond 44:2

winter forest
leaving our words
a few steps behind

Genevieve Wynand

google earth . . .
her swing set
still in the yard

Paul Murray

baseball glove
dad’s furrowed brow
softens

Bill Cooper

photos
the old barn
one winter too late

Ignatius Fay
 Haiku and Senryu 55

the dead oak

to the woodpecker
finding its voice

Peter Newton

winter light—
the barber’s breath
against my ear

Michael Dylan Welch

we speak
in complex sentences—
before and after goodbye

Joyce Clement

no matter what . . . sunset

Jeannie Martin
56 Frogpond 44:2

Remembering vincent tripi (1941–2020)

Jeannie Martin kindly shared with us some unpublished haiku by
vincent tripi in celebration of his memory and inimitable talent.

never
just one wildflower
meditation spot

fortune cookie
sure but watch
a chrysalis break-open

footprints
leading to a shell
then none

vincent tripi
 Remembering vincent tripi (1941–2020) 57

thoughts of home
i buy the avocado
with the stem

crickets . . .
it could just mean
watch-yer-step! watch-yer-step!

Sunflowers
always one
taller than i

vincent tripi
58 Frogpond 44:2

Finding Our Way

Michael Dylan Welch

I first joined the Haiku Society of America in late 1987 or 1988.

In early 1989, I moved from Southern California to the San
Francisco area, and wondered if there might be a haiku group
nearby. I remember writing all the way to New York, to Doris
Heitmeyer, the HSA secretary, to ask. Yes, she said, the Haiku Poets
of Northern California had just formed in February of that year.
I had missed the first two meetings, even though I lived nearby,
but attended my first meeting in the summer of 1989 in Golden
Gate Park, after Doris had put me in touch with vincent tripi who
gave me the meeting details. That was the day I first met vince,
Garry Gay, and Paul O. Williams, and many others in the group.
I’ll never forget how vincent welcomed me at the first meeting,
despite a troupe of drummers across the meadow occasionally
making it hard to hear. He recited a poem of mine to me that
had just won an honourable mention in Linda Valentine’s Haiku
Quarterly journal. That was my first taste of how small and close-
knit the haiku community is, and it was my pleasure, less than six
months later, to publish vince’s interview with Anita Virgil, On
My Mind, which turned out to be the very first book from my new
press, Press Here.
 Finding Our Way 59

I published a second interview he did, Raking Sand, with Virginia Brady

Young in 1993, and in between those two books, we edited Woodnotes
together. I remember many long visits sitting in his kitchen in the Inner
Richmond district, and visiting Toy Boat Café nearby, where we once
wrote a rengay called “Christmas in the City” with Nika (Jim Force)
visiting from Alberta. vince taught me a lot about editing, to see the
heart of the poem, the heart of the poet. And here we are, thirty years
later, the circle larger and larger, but also slightly smaller, still being
touched by the heart of the poet.

the silence between us

a quail finds its way
through the underbrush

for vincent tripi

(died 17 August 2020;
poem originally written for vince in July of 1999)
60 Frogpond 44:2

Renku

Before the Wind

Kasen renku composed April 1989 – January 1991

Just before the wind

piles of brown leaves
quiet with each other Virginia Brady Young

two pinky runts

root in the yard Hiroaki Sato

blushing from the steam

she rises out of
the Jacuzzi Sylvia Forges-Ryan

in a party of eight
someone prepares the roast Virginia

workshop:
a look at the crescent
brings a word Hiroaki

half hidden in the thicket

a crumpled letter Sylvia

on a green leaf
a caterpillar travels from
dark to light Virginia

its pattern both ugly

and attractive Hiroaki
 Renku 61

starless sky
their wedding rings tucked away
one inside the other Sylvia

falling out of the closet, all

her masks from theatre days Virginia

“‘Cries and laughs,

that’s life.’ Tawdry but
true, Love.” Hiroaki

still for a moment

the mockingbird Sylvia

velvet in the room—

the scent of
dried roses Virginia

outside the window

moon thinly sliced Hiroaki

with a sigh
the Tarot reader
riffles the deck Sylvia

the hiss of the snake, and

no one else to hear Virginia

anger all gone

he licks his own lips,
eyes her mouth Hiroaki

above the old gate

Venus flickering Sylvia
62 Frogpond 44:2

she watches me
from the balcony
wet with dew Hiroaki

a red balloon floats past

dragging a too-short string Virginia

autumn wind—
the guard dog’s chain
rattles Sylvia

heart on my sleeve
wife coos from the bed Hiroaki

at the edge of a leaf

a drop swells up
and falls Virginia

out of a dream the faces

on a passing train Sylvia

“You walked off, well,

with Betty” (who had played
footsie with me) Hiroaki

at the end, moonlight

fills the empty hypodermic Virginia

evening star
the garden gives up
its colors Sylvia

Carthage, Dresden,
Hiroshima & then Hiroaki
 Renku 63

Prince Charming, grey-haired

& no teeth, frantically
rings her bell Virginia

“Always too late,” she whines

to her analyst, “Too late!” Sylvia

questions of
ethical conduct
on luscious tits Hiroaki

after a steep climb

we watch lightning roll the valley Virginia

nearly home
a sudden downpour
slows my dance Sylvia

the girl next door

in a trance again Hiroaki

chimney smoke
rises to a flower
in its gauze Virginia

lifting into twilight

a skein of snow geese Sylvia
64 Frogpond 44:2

Early Moon

Junicho renku composed in March 2021 by undergraduate students

of Kala Ramesh at the Symbiosis School for Liberal Arts

sunny morning—
yellow heads swaying
on the hill Mehr Sehgal

still icy and clear

the river runs down Vishwajit Parthare

making pasta
with each drop of olive oil
the flavour explodes Gauri Kulkarni

father’s recipe book

tucked away in a corner Khwahish Vig

caught in the rain

the trees struggle
to stay rooted Tanisha Dey

the calico cat purrs

softly in his sleep Anisha Das
 Renku 65

a long long night

as thoughts of him
keep me awake Raghavi Agarwal

amidst the wedding crowd

her fingers find mine Sayali Sarode

Christmas bells
bring warmth
before the snowstorm Lakshmi Pillai

houses rush past

the train window Khwahish Vig

twinkling stars
hold conversations
with an early moon Zeal Shah

the pauper runs away

with the fallen apple Khushi Hemnani
66 Frogpond 44:2

Haibun

Insomnia
Kristen Lindquist

It’s not a problem with falling asleep, but with waking up. 3:11
a.m., my husband is snoring away. My body is relaxed, comfortable
enough, but my mind is at once on full alert: pandemic, thousands
dead. But we’re alive. How active my brain is, how much I love
my thoughts. My mind cannot conceive of a world in which it has
been blacked out forever. My mind cannot conceive of forever. But
I know I’m never falling back to sleep. Then I think of the woman
I read about who sets her alarm each night for 3:00 a.m. so she can
solve the New York Times anagram puzzle the minute it posts. She
too is awake right now, her mind running through combinations
of letters, what’s a word, what isn’t…

climactic
acclimate
calm
 Haibun 67

His Grecian Lady

Renée Owen

After the long flight, we turn onto Dad’s street. Dim streetlights
illuminate miles of concrete in the senior neighborhood. Each
house, amongst thousands, looks the same—pale white flecks of
mica sparkling in stucco. Searching for his home in the dark, our
best clue, his garden statue, a woman in a toga, urn balanced on
one shoulder. And the white plastic chair by the door for when Dad
gets winded. His hide-a-key turns the lock, the house silent with a
musty smell of disuse. I collide with his walker in the hall. One sole
nightlight gleams from his bedroom. The bed still unmade, just
as he left it. I imagine him, unable to move one side of his body,
gesturing with his one good arm for the ambulance driver to turn
off his air conditioner.

estate sale
ospreys winging over
lush Floridia yards

Papa Married An Anglo

Sharon Rhutasel-Jones

My father planted rutabagas because my mother loved them.

Mama mashed them with butter and stirred in chopped green
chile. “Que bueno,” Papa would say, tempting me when I turned
up my nose at their turnipy taste.

wedding pearls
passed on to me
my dark skin
68 Frogpond 44:2

Turning up the Heat

Diana Webb

As the chill creeps in, I think of the American dancer Loie Fuller
who swirled herself in skirts and chose from the fabrics a tweed
from the Outer Hebrides, the warp and weft of its weave.

sheep
on the skyline
a peatbog sunset

How the dye sinks into the stuff of memory. The crofts sunk into
the earth of windblown grasses. Gaelic voices. Song of the light as
it bobs on the waves. The lull of the loom.

threaded with veins

the warmth
of a sun-washed stone
 Haibun 69

Farmhouse Ballet
Glenn G. Coats

“Minor things can become moments of great revelation when encountered

for the first time.”—Dame Margot Fonteyn

There are no lights coming down the road. No tire tracks in the
lane. Clumps of snow fall from hemlock branches. A pile covers
the mailbox. Inside, the house is hushed except for an occasional
whistle through a window or door. Wide floorboards are cold.
The sisters (six and two) begin to move. They run on and off the
thistle rug. Twist and spin. Cup handfuls of air and toss them up
toward the ceiling. The girls gallop and prance on invisible horses,
stomping rhythms across wooden planks, while outside, puffs of
snow rise up, then settle down like birds in the fields.

thawing boots
the tea kettle’s
one note song
70 Frogpond 44:2

Janus
Elizabeth Fanto

talk
details of the day
best told in the dark

Alone for the first time in over fifty years on New Year’s Eve, I
watch the predictions for snow first and then turn to the festivities
in Times Square. The chair beside mine is empty. My sons have
called, my sisters and I have chatted, and I have prepared a special
meal for myself. I eat by candlelight. I waver about which side of
the bed to use tonight.

at one a.m.
blowing out the candle
missing his scent
 Haibun 71

Buda (( Pest
Matthew Caretti

The river curves between them. Two cities stitched together by

eight bridges. Each quiet during this pandemic. Quiet on this new
year’s eve.

city sundown sparks a taper of rooftops

Climbing to St. Gellert’s cross. Here the burden of so much history.

Then past the old façade of the U.S. embassy. There a greater
burden of acrimony.

balcony flowers dead of winter

The tinny rasp of new keys. Perhaps this place will remedy my
writer’s block. Perhaps the polished stylus of Anonymous will
conjure the Muse.

blue danube grey with rain-fed thoughts

* Anonymous is the statue of the hooded figure opposite Vajdahunyad Castle in

Budapest, the unknown chronicler at the court of King Béla III (r 1172–96) who
wrote a history of the early Magyars. He holds a pen with the shiny tip in his hand
that writers stroke for inspiration.
72 Frogpond 44:2

Two Years of Mackinac Island

Carmen Sterba

During winter on Mackinac Island, we students wished to see

the blue lake again, but the compacted ice surrounding the island
hadn’t budged for five months. There were no ferries to cross to
Michigan. The only way to cross was by a Cessna or a snowmobile.
So we learned cross-country skiing. Once the classes were finished,
we had the freedom to run out to the shed and get our skis to glide
inland where there was a café for hot drinks and chat.

a hint of snowmelt—
from the rooftop, two guys shout,
“Spring is coming!”

Equinox
Stuart Bartow

Would life be worse or better if we were more like chickadees,

whose gonads enlarge in spring, then shrink back down in fall,
the energy changing to body strength to endure winter, and brain
power to remember seed caches? Would I be a better teacher
throughout the school year, finishing just in time in May, and
then…

derelict mailbox
chickadees
move in
 Haibun 73

Parkinson’s Play
Stella Pierides

While my physical therapist demonstrates how to juggle three

tennis balls, I look on in disbelief. No way... She reads my face.
“You can do it,” she tells me in her matter-of-fact way. “Juggling
improves hand-eye coordination.” When I throw, all balls end
up bouncing around the room. We burst out laughing. “Practice,
practice, practice,” she says.

just as
the snowdrops wither
cherry blossoms

Sundown
Taofeek Ayeyemi

a group of fowls prance down the garden, using the exit gate. in the
distance, hawks are circling above a bushfire. i begin my rehearsal,
my gaze fixed at the crimsoned sky. a band of cicadas make a jazz
to my poetic lines.

harmattan deepens . . .
a beggar’s lead beaks
a sachet water

* haramattan is a season in West Africa between November and March marked by

dry, dusty wind; a beggar’s lead is a young person who leads a blind beggar; a sachet
water is a plastic bag of drinking water, an inexpensive alternative to bottled water.
74 Frogpond 44:2

Cohesion
Tom Painting

The pike hits the red and white daredevil lure on my first cast and
tangles itself in the eel grass yards from the rowboat. My father,
in an uncommon show of patience, encourages me to calm. Keep
some tension on the line, he says. Eventually, that fish will make
a run for it and then you’ll be able to reel him in. And so, we wait
out a portion of the morning, I holding the rod and my father with
the net cradled in his hands.

glass partition
the mimed space
between us
 Haibun 75

Unmasked
Lew Watts

It’s the annual Yellowstone trip. Of the twenty-five attending, only

two are newbies. We have in common two things: a love of fly
fishing and a deep knowledge of the back-slapping, oil business.
They’re all Republicans, of course; they think I am, too.

a red flash
from the bald eagle
cutthroat trout

Drinks before dinner, I’m getting ribbed for ripping my waders on

a log. It’s my second scotch, though Buck’s already had four. Like
me, he’s retired—most of the guys are.

remote river
still unable to reel in
this thirst

“Hey, Lew!” Greg shouts across the room. “There’s a poet with the
same name as you.” I try to ignore him—my first collection has
just appeared. “I was Googling members. Sure looks like you,” he
continues. “Hell, it is you!” he shouts, holding up his phone.

in each photo
the same smug grin—
fish porn

Silence settles on the room. All eyes turn to Chuck, the patriarch
of the group. His large belt buckle shimmers as he leans back in his
chair and spreads his legs. “You’re not a fucking liberal, are you?”

vivid dancer . . .
through the split nymph’s skin
emerging blue
76 Frogpond 44:2

Revisit
Kendall Lott

I stand on the banks of the Tennessee River. At this favorite place of

recreation when I was a boy, I now see a faded, weathered, wooden
memorial standing in the edge of the water. Native Americans
asking for reverence claim that these waters cover an area of their
sacred burial ground. I bow my head and close my eyes. I can still
feel my bare feet on the hot imported sand beach, hear the sound
of laughter mingled with screaming boat motors, and see my water
skis bouncing over their losses.

untangling fishing line—

blood
on a treble hook

Ohio
Tim Cremin

We were on the Commons by the bell when the shots were fired.
Unarmed college students gunned down by the National Guard in
broad daylight. “Four dead,” Neil Young sang, and the song became
our anthem. We were going to change the world. The next year, I
graduated and took a job in Connecticut. The year after that, Nixon
won 49 states. Classic rock stations still play the song sometimes.

national anthem
a white cop takes a knee
on a black man’s neck
 Haibun 77

Cleaning House
Colleen M. Farrelly

another storm brewing

boxing
the window A/C—

He says the air was cleaner in Afghanistan. In a year, he’ll be

somewhere else, and I’ll still be here. I see soft targets when I sprint
past swings and slides and sidewalks etched in cheerful COVID
slogans. The house creaks and cracks, and I confess shared secrets
left unspoken as I sanitize the room.

dirt clinging
to old masks
my diary

Sisyphus
George Swede

Our kitchen’s pine cupboards were last polished 20 years ago—

before that, every two years or less. The will to do wears out, no
matter what.

our old maple

ants touring
its rings
78 Frogpond 44:2

Sloughing Off
Brad Bennett

Sycamores seem to be static, rooted, utterly immobile, but are

always changing. They grow more than two feet a year. Their
bark, sloughed off and curling, becomes smooth armor for the
shins and forearms of child superheroes. Their fruit: one-inch tan
orbs, clumps of feathery seeds, each covered in fine hairs. I would
slide through a hole in the backyard fence, gather up a pile, pluck
out some seeds, and toss them to the wind. Sycamores also drop
branches, flowers, pollen, and of course, big, platter-sized, heart-
shaped leaves of golden brown. Some folks call sycamores “trash
trees.” I think maybe they’ve learned the secret of a long life: ditch
what you don’t need.

last night’s storm . . .

only dead branches
circling the trunk

86ed
Terri L. French

His feet on the metal footrests curl in like evening lotus. The
ash on the filter-less cigarette threatens to fall into his lap at any
moment. I point my finger to direct his attention. He flicks the ash
and stuffs the butt into an empty beer can. He always remembered
our names, how we liked our steaks cooked, what type of wine we
liked, and he always sat us at the cozy table for two by the fire.
Now, he lives in a group home, his once tall body crumpled into a
wheelchair.

after hours—
a fifth of Jack
and eggs over-easy
 Haibun 79

Journeyman
Keith Polette

Neither father nor uncle ever guided my hand with drill or saw.
Instead, I attended to the whispered urgings of oak and cedar
and ash. My hands found the grip that fit the heft of hammer
handle and the sharp bones of carpenter’s square. In time, my arm
and breath and back fell together like waves at hightide into the
rhythm of crosscut. During those days, with my back to the light,
I built the boat of myself by hand, pitched with pine, and pointing
the prow towards the place where the moon was rising, learned to
row through the long planks of days.

summer leaves
the wind-swept sails
of clipper ships

Human Marquee According to the Crows

Vicki Miko

“Nothing is unreal as long as you can imagine a crow.”—Munia Khan

Now playing on balconies above the alleyway in the mini-

amphitheater: the card players, the pot gardener, the cat sitter, the
hammock loller, the grizzly grillers, and the stationary biker lost
in her mobius trance. Are they watching us watching them? On
the fourth-floor penthouse, the finale of the half-naked party boys
with their half-dozen surfboards propped towards the sun gods;
thank god they are gone, evicted from their playful sanctuary!

a preening crow
for a moment
headless
80 Frogpond 44:2

Watching the River Flow

LeRoy Gorman

When summer came, you boated & swam from dawn to dusk.
When fall came, you waited in a blind for ducks to come. When
winter came, you laced up & skated for miles. When spring came,
you waited for ice to clear & the fish to spawn again.

ferry crossing
the long line
behind a hearse

Heart-Springs
Michele Root-Bernstein

after supper my best friend and I make up a game with no name

we sit on the grass and pick a word any word

dumb

on the count of three we look into each other’s eyes and begin to
chant

dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb

the rules are not to look away from each other and not to ever stop
until

on a sudden dusk
all the world one ear
one drum
 81

Linked Verse
Rengay, Sequences, and Tan-Renga

Stick Figures
Julie Schwerin and Michael Dylan Welch

winter morning
thirty-six Play-Doh
snowmen Julie

home isolation
I tell the kids I’m bored Michael

finding my flashlight app

a tunnel between
their blanket fort and mine Julie

record cold—
the bulb burns out
in the Easy-Bake Oven Michael

binging all six seasons

of Master Chef Junior Julie

spring evening—
the fridge magnet holds
our stick-figure family Michael
82 Frogpond 44:2

Left Unclaimed
Angela Terry and Julie Schwerin

drifting stars . . .
the river
continues to flow Angela

champagne
at the wake Julie

everyone
wearing black
except the widow Angela

his tuxedo
left unclaimed
at the cleaners Julie

the name
no one mentions Angela

a great void—
that hole
in the water Julie
 Linked Verse 83

Derailed
Michele L. Harvey

diagnosis
winnowing the world
to now

infusion day . . .
young nurses
compare recipes

chemo brain . . .
a knitted cap
for added warmth

bluebird call
the wide open sky
of remission
84 Frogpond 44:2

Kala Ramesh

walking barefoot a pinprick from a jagged stone

untouched veena
the moon
an old melody
on a never-ending journey
adding its weight
my quest for truth

in the meditation hall Bodhidharma in a one-hand clapping frenzy

 Linked Verse 85

Watering
John Thompson and Chuck Brickley

adding staccato
to the fountain’s gurgle
a passing shower John

sparkling the most

the yellow oxalis we missed Chuck

taking what it can

from the ocean mists—
douglas iris John

nestling deeper
into a calla lily
two earwigs Chuck

hunting for night crawlers

under the northern lights John

morning glow
my wife waves a rainbow
over our garden Chuck
86 Frogpond 44:2

Fluid Dynamics
Bryan Rickert and Kat Lehman

everything
we used to be
drifting snow Bryan

into the stream

another self Kat

slow rain
a puddle widens
the silence Bryan

swelling sea
the ancient brine
in every cell Kat

between us
only mist Bryan

cumulonimbus
the familiar shift
into shadows Kat
 Linked Verse 87

Love of Reading
Dan Schwerin and Julie Schwerin

his love of reading

a woman
in a blue dress Dan

the deftness of his fingers

over the braille Julie

she guides him

bread soaking up
the oil Dan

without a word
the sun’s slow slip
below the horizon Julie

spooning one dessert

deep in the glass Dan

sweet endings . . .
the first page
of the sequel Julie
88 Frogpond 44:2

The Climb
Bryan Rickert and Terri L. French

mountain crossing
our silent
topography Bryan

the cairn’s top stone

teetering Terri

on hands and knees

slow progress
up the scree Bryan

alpine winter
a family of pika
snug in their burrow Terri

in every crevice
aster blooms Bryan

summit camp
the soleless boots
we left behind Terri
 Linked Verse 89

Brad Bennett and Kristen Lindquist

birch bark
flapping in the wind
the antics of crows Brad

an urgent need
to write it all down Kristen

Jennifer Hambrick and Brad Bennett

quitting time
the crunch of salt
under my feet Jennifer

a winter tilt
to the crescent moon Brad
90 Frogpond 44:2

Essays
Everything You Always Wanted To Know About
Persimmons
from A Field Guide to North American Haiku1
by Charles Trumbull

P ersimmons are grown around the world.2 The oriental

persimmon, Diospyros kaki, is native to China, spread to Japan
in the seventh century, and was imported to California, southern
Europe, and South America in the nineteenth century. This is the
persimmon known as 柿 (kaki) in Japan. There are thousands of
cultivars, but kaki are basically of two types, astringent and sweet.
The astringent type has a high level of tannin and is inedible until
fully ripened and the pulp has turned jelly-like. The most common
cultivar of this type in Japan and the U.S. is the hachiya (蜂屋柿
hachiyagaki).

Sweet cultivars—smaller and flatter than the hachiya—may be

consumed while still firm and are commonly sliced for salads and
fruit bowls or cooked or baked in breads and puddings. Sweet
varieties include fuyū (富有 or 富有柿 fuyūgaki) and jirō (次郎 or
次郎柿柿 jirōgaki). A specially sweet variety called Sharon fruit is
marketed in Israel.

Shibugaki 渋柿 is the name given a bitter persimmon, which is peeled,

hung on a string or pole, and massaged daily to evaporate the juices
and leave the sugars that coat the outside of the fruit. When dried
for preservation, these fruits are called 吊柿 tsurushigaki (hanging
persimmons). In the old days when sugar was too expensive for
common folk, these dried, sweet persimmons were used instead
of sugar. 干柿 hoshigaki are still very popular confection in Japan.

吊柿鳥に顎なき夕べかな
tsurushigaki tori ni ago naki yūbe kana
 Essays 91

hanging persimmons
birds without jaws
at evening
Iijima Haruko, retranslation after Fay Aoyagi
in Blue Willow Haiku World blog, October 16, 2015

The leaves of the persimmon tree are also edible and are pickled,
fermented, and sold as a snack and used to wrap sushi. Persimmon
wood is in demand for fine cabinetry, musical instruments, sports
equipment, and the like.

In Japan, every stage of the development and processing of

persimmons is carefully observed and accorded appropriate kigo
(season words), for example:

Blossoms (柿の花 kaki no hana)—pink for male flowers and off-

white for female—midsummer kigo

Hanging new curtains—

blooms already showing on
the persimmon tree
David Burleigh, Winter Sunlight (1992)

Growth of leaves (柿の葉 kaki no ha) and new leaves (柿若葉

kakiwakaba)—also midsummer kigo

柿若葉風にゆらゆら径の上
kaki wakaba fū ni yurayura wataru no ue

fresh persimmon leaves

shadows swaying on the path
in the gentle wind
Murakami Shinsei, in Ehime International Haiku
Club, An Anthology of International Haiku, vol. 7,
April 2010 – March 2011
92 Frogpond 44:2

Falling blossoms (柿の花散る kaki no hana chiru)

柿の花咋日散しは黄ばみ見ゆ
kaki no hana kinō chirishi wa kibami miyu

The flowers of the persimmon;

Those which fell yesterday
Look yellowish.
Buson, in R. H. Blyth, Haiku 2: Spring (1950)

Leaves changing color (柿紅葉 kaki momiji). The leaves are beautiful
in themselves, but their changing color and falling is considered
especially interesting, perhaps because that is the signal that the
fruit is beginning to ripen. Japanese children collect the colored
persimmon leaves.

柿の葉や仏の色に成るとちる
kaki no ha ya hotoke no iro ni naru to chiru

persimmon leaves
turn Buddha-colored . . .
then fall
Issa, trans. David G. Lanoue, Haiku of Kobayashi Issa
website

“Buddha-colored” = “golden”

Waiting for the fruit to ripen. The persimmon fruits remain

ripening in the tree long after the leaves are gone. William J.
Higginson makes the point that “Waiting for persimmons to ripen
is a classic test of patience in Japan.”3

此の柿は澁いか烏見てのみぞ
kono kaki wa shibui ka karasu mite nomi zo
 Essays 93

persimmons so tart
not even crows
give ’em a glance!
Umezawa Bokusui, trans. Adam L. Kern, The Penguin
Book of Haiku (2018)

impatience the taste of an unripe persimmon

S. B. Friedman, Modern Haiku 38:3 (Autumn 2007)

persimmon still hanging the extra day of the year

Jim Kacian, The Betty Drevniok Award 2008, 3rd
Prize

But birds love persimmons too, and choosing the optimal time to
pick the luscious ripe fruit, before the birds get to them, is a high
art. The World Kigo Database notes, “Usually the kaki fruit high up
in the tree are eaten by crows as a favorite food, and the fallen fruit
are eaten by the badgers (tanuki) to provide for their winter fat.”

A last persimmon
hanging between bare branches —
the hesitant sun
David Burleigh, Winter Sunlight (1992)

柿一つつくねんとして時雨哉
kaki hitotsu tsukunen to shite shigure kana

one persimmon
droops listlessly . . .
winter rain
Issa, trans. David G. Lanoue, Haiku of Kobayashi Issa
website
94 Frogpond 44:2

Lanoue notes, “kaki hitotsu means ‘a persimmon’ not, as I first

thought, ‘a persimmon tree.’ One tree would be ippon, not hitotsu…
It is the custom in some provinces to leave one persimmon on the
tree, probably for birds.”

Topmost bough: one last persimmon for the winter birds

James Kirkup, Short Takes (1993)

in “pecking order”
mockers, jays, siskins, finches . . .
the last persimmon
George Knox, Modern Haiku 25:2 (Summer 1994)

一茶忌の柿喰ふ椋鳥をゆるし置く
issaki no kaki ku’u muku o yurushi oku

Issa’s Memorial Day—

I let the gray starling feed on
a persimmon
Yoshino Yoshiko, trans. Lee Gurga and Emiko
Miyashita, in Yoshino Yoshiko, Tsuru (2001)

Issa’s Memorial Day, 一茶忌 Issa ki, is January 5.

a lone persimmon
lets go of the tree
Bob Boldman, Eating a Melon (1981)

The lure and pleasure of eating a ripe persimmon. 柿 kaki, the

fruit, is a kigo for late autumn, the period of activity and most
interest to persimmon eaters.

Shiki used persimmons as an inducement or a reward for hard

work:
 Essays 95

三千の俳句を閲し柿ニつ
sanzen no haiku o kemishi kaki futatsu

after judging
three thousand haiku
two persimmons
Shiki-Kinen Museum English Volunteers, ed. and
trans., If Someone Asks … (2001), 48. ‘Working all day
into the night, finally scraping the bottom of the
haiku box’ There was a haiku box for submissions to
his column in the Nippon Newspaper beside Shiki’s
pillow. We can imagine how good the persimmons
tasted after reading through the many haiku,
especially because they were his favorite fruit.

Early American senryu master Clement Hoyt was not surprised

by Shiki’s indulgence:

Shiki, no wonder
after three thousand haiku
persimmons were sweet
Storm of Stars (1970), 148

But Shiki could also find solace in a persimmon at a time of grief:

芭蕉忌に參らずひとり柿を喰ふ
Bashōki ni mairazu hitori kaki o kuu

Bashō’s death date

I miss the ceremony
but eat a persimmon alone
trans. C. Trumbull from the Japanese as well as the
Russian translation by Aleksandr Dolin, in Цветы
ямабуки (Tsvety yamabuki; 1999; Mountain Roses), 40
96 Frogpond 44:2

Shiki understood the risks of overindulgence:

柿あまた食ひけるよりの病かな
kaki amata kuikeru yori no yamai kana

Ill,
From overeating
Persimmons.
R. H. Blyth, Haiku 4: Autumn–Winter (1952)

Yet, he chose to overdo it anyway:

我が好きの柿を食はれぬ病かな
waga suki no kaki o kuwarenu yamai kana

The persimmons I love so much,

Can’t be eaten:
I’m ill.
R. H. Blyth, Haiku 4: Autumn–Winter (1952)

柿喰の俳句好みしと傳ふべし
kaki kui no haiku konomishi to tsutaubeshi

He sized it all up with this verse under the headnote “After I Die”:

柿喰の俳句好みしと傳ふべし
kakikui no haiku konomishi to tsutau beshi

you can report

I ate persimmons
and loved haiku
trans. Stephen Addiss, The Art of Haiku (2012)

There is a note of sadness in Izen’s haiku, as well:

 Essays 97

別るゝや柿食いながら坂の上
wakaruru ya kaki kui nagara saka no ue

Parting,
And walking up the slope,
eating a persimmon.
Hirose Izen, trans. R. H. Blyth, A History of Haiku 1
(1963), 177 “This verse was composed in the 7th year
of Genroku, when saying good-bye to Bashō.”

Patricia Neubauer seems to channel William Carlos Williams, the

poet who ate the plums in his icebox:

last ripe persimmon

after everyone goes to bed
— I eat it
Patricia Neubauer, Frogpond 16:2 (Fall–Winter 1993)

persimmon
the bruised part sweetest
John Sandbach, Step into Sky (2018) #35, p. 43

in my loneliness
I let the persimmon
get overripe
John Ziemba, in Raffael de Gruttola, Lawrence
Rungren, and John Ziemba, eds., The Ant’s Afternoon:
Haiku and Senryu by Members of the Boston Haiku Society
(December 1990)

Socioeconomic significance
Beyond the cult of growing and eating the fruit, persimmon trees
had a broader importance in old Japan. First, as is pointed out in the
World Kigo Database, “dried kaki fruit was sometimes the only food the
98 Frogpond 44:2

poor farmers in the Edo period could eat in winter, since they had to
give away all their rice to the authorities for tax purposes. Therefore,
the kaki trees around each farm house were pure necessity to feed the
hungry children.” It follows that owning many persimmon trees was
a sign of prosperity. Bashō composed two haiku that illustrate the
importance of persimmon trees to the economy:

里古りて柿の木持たぬ家もなし
sato furite kaki no ki motanu ie mo nashi

a village grown old:

no house without
a persimmon tree
David Landis Barnhill, trans., Bashō’s Haiku (2004) #702

祖父親孫の栄えや柿蜜柑
ōji oya mago no sakae ya kaki mikan

grandfather and parents

the prosperity of grandchildren
in persimmons and oranges
Jane Reichhold, trans., Basho: Complete Haiku (2008) #749

This old neighborhood.

The house where I used to live
The persimmon tree.
Jerry Ball, The Sound of Shoes (1984)

where we lived
persimmons still clinging
here and there
Joseph Robello, Modern Haiku 49:1 (Winter–Spring
2018), 106
 Essays 99

One owner of a persimmon orchard was Mukai Kyorai, a wealthy

merchant and chief among the ten main disciples of Bashō.
Kyorai built a hermitage that he called Rakushisha (落柿舎,
Hut or Hermitage of Fallen Persimmons) in the district of Saga-
Arashiyama west of Kyoto. As the story goes, Kyorai had cultivated
40 persimmon trees on the property and was just planning to
harvest and sell the fruit when an overnight windstorm took the
whole crop, hence the name “Hut of Fallen Persimmons.” Bashō
visited Rakushisha several times and wrote his Saga Diary (嵯峨日
記 Saga nikki) during a stay there in 1691. 4

Kyorai’s house
even if they could be too bitter5
ripe persimmons
Bruce Ross, Mainichi Daily News Daily Haiku Selec-
tion, January 10, 2012, and Mainichi Daily News
Annual Selection 2012

Persimmons outside Japan

Nearly all of the persimmons sold in the United States are of the
Oriental kaki type cultivated in California, notably in the San
Joaquin Valley. Another species of the plant, however, Diospyros
virginiana, is native to the eastern and southern U.S. and grows
wild in several states. In fact, the word “persimmon” derives from
a word in a native American language. American haiku pioneer
Nick Virgilio wrote:

A wild persimmon
beyond the reach of the raccoon:
the autumn moon.
Modern Haiku 7:2 (May 1976)

Peggy Willis Lyles of Georgia named the fruit in several haiku:

100 Frogpond 44:2

first frost . . .
on a silver card tray
wild persimmons
Modern Haiku 18:3 (Autumn 1987)

wild persimmons . . .
a woman at the roadside
wiggles her last tooth
Frogpond 14:2 (Summer 1991)

Tennessee resident John Wills mused on the trees:

To wander there . . .
the meadow where the wild
persimmons blow!
Young Leaves (1970)

The persimmon is often seen as emblematic of Japan and

suggestive of haiku. James R. and Mary C. Taylor published a
haiku journal called Persimmon in Michigan from 1997 to 1999.
A very active website called Caqui—Revista Brasiliera de Haicai6
and the publishing house Edicões Caqui are run by the Grêmio
Haicai Ipê (Ipê Haiku Guild) in São Paulo, Brazil. Kaki, along with
haiku and other aspects of Japanese culture, came to Brazil in the
1890s and still flourish there, especially among the large Japanese
Brazilian population.

Já o sol caiu: Already sundown

as frutas dos caquizeiros, the fruits of the persimmon trees
no escuro, brilhando . . . in the dark, shining

H. Masuda Goga, from Goga, Roberto Saito, and

Eunice Arruda, eds., Haicai: A poesia do kigô (March
1995); trans. C. Trumbull
 Essays 101

Música do vento. Music of the wind

Por um instante me ausento For a moment I’m gone
Do pomar de caquis. from the caqui orchard
Teruka Oda, from Débora Novaes de Castro, ed.,
Hai-kais ao sol: I antologia de hai-kais (1995); trans. C.
Trumbull

Persimmon as metaphor or transference

Haiku poets find aspects of persimmons useful in their
writing about the human condition. Issa, for example,
was fascinated with the astringency (渋味 shibumi, usually
translated as “sour”) of persimmons—sour persimmons
(渋柿 shibugaki), especially mountain persimmons (山柿 yamagaki):

渋柿をはむは烏のまま子哉
yama-gaki mo hotoke no me ni wa ama karan

eating the sour

persimmon, the crow
stepchild
Issa, trans. David G. Lanoue, Haiku of Kobayashi Issa website

Lanoue explains, “Issa was a stepchild. Here, he imagines that the crow,
eating the astringent persimmon, must be an unloved stepchild—a
way of writing about his own childhood while seeming to be writing
about a crow.” He dotted the “i” with this haiku four years later (1820):

渋柿をこらへてくうや京の児
shibugaki o koraete kuu ya miyako no ko

enduring the sour

persimmon . . .
Kyoto child
Issa, trans. Lanoue, Haiku of Kobayashi Issa website
102 Frogpond 44:2

渋かろかしらねど柿の初ちぎり
shibukaro ka shiranedo kaki no hatsuchigiri

I don’t know
if it will be bitter —
the first persimmon
Chiyo-ni, trans. Stephen Addiss, The Art of Haiku (2012)

quarreling with my lover the persimmon moon

Frank K. Robinson, Cicada 2:3 (1978)

after the quarrel

aftertaste
of persimmons
Geraldine Clinton Little, Frogpond 7:2 (1984)

listening to
the drama queen
I peel a persimmon
Fay Aoyagi, In Borrowed Shoes (2006)

Persimmons are inextricably associated with Masaoka Shiki. He

wrote more than 100 haiku on the fruit. His most famous one
captured his reaction upon biting into a persimmon:

柿喰へば鐘が鳴るなり法隆寺
kaki kueba kane ga naru nari Hōryūji

As I eat a persimmon
The temple bell tolls at
Hōryūji.
trans. Donald Keene, The Winter Sun Shines In (2013)
 Essays 103

In their book If Someone Asks … (2001), the Shiki-Kinen Museum

English Volunteers in Matsu­yama, who are custodians of Shiki’s
writings, explain Shiki’s haiku:

Taking a rest at a tea shop at Hōryūji temple. When Shiki

was on his way back to Tōkyō from Matsuyama, he stopped
in Nara on October 24. He was excited to see the area,
the home of so much of the ancient history of Japan. The
sound he heard was actually from a bell at Tōdaiji temple,
so this haiku is not a true record. He probably used the
temple Hōryūji because the area around it is famous for
persimmons, this favorite fruit, and it is the oldest standing
Buddhist temple in Japan. The sound of the name, too, is
more like the long, fading tones of a temple bell.

The peripatetic poet Santōka wrote a number of haiku linking

ripe persimmons to the happy occasion of the arrival of his mail.
He was usually on the road, but he planned ahead and picked up
his letters at pre-specified spots on his itinerary. Santōka was fond
of both persimmon fruit and leaves.

やっと郵便がきて
それから熟柿がおちるだけ

yatto yūbin ga kite

sorekara jukushi no ochiru dake

Finally the mail came and now only ripe persimmons drop
Hiroaki Sato, Santoka: Grass and Tree Cairn (2002)

しぐれて　　かきのはの　いよいようつくしく
shigurete kaki no ha no iyoiyo utsukushiku

The rain-soaked persimmon leaves

Become even more beautiful.
trans. John Stevens, in Santōka, Mountain Tasting #116
104 Frogpond 44:2

Many modern and contemporary poets—from Japan and the West—

write about persimmons, too, and often explore aspects of the plant
beyond its astringency or tastiness. Here is a small sampler.

空襲警報るいるいとして柿あかし
kūshū keihō ruirui to shite kaki akashi

air raid sirens

one after another
persimmons are red
Santōka, trans. Scott Watson, “Weeds We’d Wed,”
Tohoku Gakuin Review (2000) #48

日がさして熟柿の中の種みゆる
hi ga sashite jukushi no naka no tane miyuru

when sunlight falls

onto a ripe persimmon
the seeds can be seen
Hasegawa Kai, trans. Tanaka Kimiyo and David
Burleigh, “The Haiku of Hasegawa Kai”, Modern Haiku
42:3 (Autumn 2011)

Late Autumn
Against the white clay wall
Ripened persimmons
Reflect the remaining light of sunset.
Shinko Fushimi, in Noriko Mizusaki and Mayumi Sako,
eds., For a Beautiful Planet: Voices from Contemporary Sixteen
Poets of Japan (2009). [Published here in English only.]

吊鐘のなかの月日も柿の秋
tsurigane no naka no tsukihi mo kaki no aki
 Essays 105

months and days

inside the temple bell
persimmon autumn

Iida Ryūta, trans. Fay Aoyagi, Blue Willow Haiku World

blog, October 5, 2009

柿食うて暗きもの身にたるむかな
kaki kuute kuraki mono mi ni tarumu kana

Eating a persimmon
darkness builds inside me

Ōno Rinka, in Modern Haiku Association, Japanese

Haiku 2001

逢えぬ夜の熟柿を吸う冷たさよ
aenu yoru no jukushi o suu tsumeta-sa yo

Oh coldness sucking the ripe persimmons out of the night

we cannot meet
Ginema, from the series “The Night-Crying Stones,”
trans. Eric Selland, in Roadrunner 11:3 (October
2011). Translator’s note: “ripe persimmons” means
waiting it out or biding one’s time.

war news . . .
an old peasant talks to
the persimmon tree

Marili Deandrea, The Heron’s Nest 6:10 (November

2004)

子規の夭折ときには羨し柿の蔕
Shiki no yōsetsu toki ni wa tomoshi kaki no heta
106 Frogpond 44:2

Sometimes I envy
Shiki’s early passing—
persimmon calyx
Itami Mikihiko, Bruce Ross et al., eds.,
A Vast Sky (2015)

my first lover
now follows Buddha . . .
dried persimmons
Lynn Edge, Modern Haiku 46:2 (Summer 2015)

another exception
to the rule
dried persimmons
Angela Terry, The Heron’s Nest 16:2 (June 2014)

using chemistry after all this time dried persimmon

Beverly Acuff Momoi, Acorn 33 (Fall 2014)

In the cubicles
the kafkaesque
of a persimmon
Paul Pfleuger, Jr., Roadrunner IX:2 (May 2009)

ジミ・ヘンドリクス干柿知らずに死す
Jimi Hendorikusu hoshigaki shirazuni shisu

Jimi Hendrix
he died without
tasting a dried persimmon
Noguchi Ruri, Spica Haiku Web Magazine, September
1, 2013; trans. Fay Aoyagi, Blue Willow Haiku World
blog, October 24, 2014
 Essays 107

And, finally, in addition their beneficial vitamins and minerals,

perhaps persimmons have laxative benefits:

雪隠の神はまる貌柿の秋
setchin no kami wa maru kao kaki no aki

God of the toilet

with a round face—
autumn persimmon
Miyasaka Shizuo, in Modern Haiku Association,
Japanese Haiku 2001. Maru is a type of persimmon.

Notes:
1 “A Field Guide to North American Haiku” is a long-term project
along the lines of a haiku encyclopedia-cum-saijiki, a selection of the
best English-language haiku arranged by topic and illustrating what
it is about a given topic that attracts poets to write. When complete,
the Field Guide project will comprise multiple thick volumes keyed
to the several topics in traditional Japanese saijiki (haiku almanac)
and Western counterparts, notably William J. Higginson’s Haiku
World: An International Poetry Almanac (1996). These topics are:
Season, Sky & Elements, Landscape, Plants, Animals, Human
Affairs, and Observances. The haiku are selected from my Haiku
Database, currently containing almost 475,000 haiku. “Persimmons”
presents haiku selected from 724 haiku indexed under PLANTS:
persimmon: 346 haiku originally written in English, 372 translations
from Japanese, and 6 translations from other languages. Publishing
these miniature topical haiku anthologies is an experiment to
test the feasibility of the larger Field Guide project. Critique and
suggestions, supportive or critical, are warmly invited; please
comment by e-mail to cptrumbull\at\comcast.net.
2 Some fine articles about persimmons worldwide are Georgia
Freedman, “Beyond Fuyus: The World of Persimmon Varieties,”
Serious Eats website: https://www.seriouseats.com/2020/10/persimmons.
108 Frogpond 44:2

html; Rich Zimmerman, “Persimmons, A Colorful Fruit of the

Late Autumn,” Under the Solano Sun website: https://ucanr.edu/blogs/
blogcore/postdetail.cfm?postnum=11876; and “Persimmon,” Wikipedia:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persimmon.
3 Higginson, loc. cit.
4 Charles Trumbull, “Rakushisha,” Haikupedia (posted April 25, 2021):
https://haikupedia.org/article-haikupedia/rakushisha-2/
5 This haiku was printed incorrectly by the Mainichi Daily News. Bruce
Ross approved this version.
6 https://www.kakinet.com/cms/.

Charles Trumbull is a past president of the Haiku Society of America and

recipient of its Sora Award. He edited Modern Haiku (2006 to 2013), and
was Honorary Curator of the American Haiku Archives in 2013. A haiku
chapbook was published in 2011, and his book of New Mexico haiku, A
Five-Balloon Morning, in June 2013. A History of Modern Haiku followed
in 2019. Trumbull helped organize the Chi-ku haiku group in Chicago
and the Santa Fe Haiku Study Group; the biennial Midwest—Cradle of
American Haiku conferences, and two Haiku North America conferences
(1999 and 2017; and two international conferences in Kraków, Poland
(2003 and 2015). For more than 30 years he has been collecting haiku for
his electronic Haiku Database, which currently contains almost a half
million entries. His latest project is Haikupedia, an online encyclopedia of
all things haiku (www.haikupedia.org).
 Essays 109

The Heft of Haiku

by Michael Dylan Welch

I t occurred to me recently that one way to apprehend the difference

between the sounds of Japanese and the syllables of English is
to think of baseball. The pattern of 5-7-5 sounds (not syllables) in
a Japanese haiku produces a poem of a particular heft or weight.
Think of that as being like a baseball. And I do mean a baseball—a
specific size of ball used in American professional baseball leagues.
But if you write 5-7-5 syllables in an English haiku, you end up
producing a bigger ball—like a softball—because of differences in
language. Japanese words are typically many short staccato syllables,
so a Japanese haiku reaches 17 sounds using fewer words and less
content than an English haiku provides in 17 syllables. In fact, I
recently read an observation by Kit Pancoast Nagamura, a Japan-
based haiku poet who hosted NHK’s “Haiku Masters” television
show for three years, that if you write 17 syllables in English, you
can easily write enough content to fill two haiku in Japanese (in her
book, Grit, Grace, and Gold: Haiku Celebrating the Sports of Summer).
Thus, an English-language haiku will typically reach the weight and
size of a “baseball” with fewer than 17 syllables, whereas insisting
on 5-7-5 syllables nearly always produces a larger “softball” size of
poem. As a result, a 17-syllable haiku in English may be said to be
“obese” compared with the leaner weight of a Japanese haiku. That
leaner haiku isn’t “hefty” at all, but does have a particular heft.

Although it helps to know Japanese, one can still get a feel for
this difference in heft by listening to haiku in both Japanese and
English, hearing the distinction that 5-7-5 syllables in English
nearly always takes longer to say, never mind that the English also
contains more words, concepts, or images. Sensitivity to the words
and images shared in Japanese haiku will give you an additional
sense of each poem’s individual heft, and therefore a sense of
the heft of the genre itself if you pay attention to many haiku in
Japanese, even if only through translation.
110 Frogpond 44:2

You can also get a feel for the difference by using Google Translate
on any Japanese text other than haiku. If you count the sounds of
the Japanese—properly counting vowels with macrons such as ō or
ū as two sounds and the “n” sound as an additional sound at the
ends of words—you’ll see that the English nearly always has fewer
syllables. To illustrate with a specific example in prose, a note in
Japanese on the Haiku International Association (HIA) website
says the following:

国際俳句交流協会では、季刊誌「HI」やこちらのホーム
ページ及び電子メールを使い、会員の皆様にご案内やご
連絡をしております。

The romaji for this text is as follows, and counts out to 78 on

(sounds, counting “HI” spelled out as “e/i/chi/a/i” for “aitch, eye”),
confirmed by a native Japanese speaker:

Kokusai haiku kōryū kyōkaide wa, kikan-shi HI ya kochira no

hōmupēji oyobi denshi mēru o tsukai, kaiin no minasama ni go
an’nai ya go renraku o shite orimasu.

In comparison, below is the website’s own translation of the same

text in English. Here they are translating the content, with no need
to accommodate any particular syllable count (thus, no intentional
padding or chopping), which comes out to only 59 syllables. This
includes two instances of “HIA,” each counted as three syllables in
English, one syllable for each letter, which does not even occur in
the Japanese, making the English longer than it could have been
because the first acronym could have been omitted and the second
one could have been replaced by “It,” reducing this content to just
54 syllables. Also notice, simply visually, how the English takes up
more space on the page, despite having significantly fewer syllables
compared to the number of Japanese sounds:
 Essays 111

HIA, the Haiku International Association, has no account

with either Instagram or Facebook, and does not maintain
a presence on either of those platforms. HIA publishes a
quarterly magazine called HI.

The difference in this specific example is about 76 percent—the

English needs only 76 percent of the syllables (compared to the
number of sounds in Japanese) to get the same information across
(or just 69 percent if the HIA acronyms are revised in the English).
Pick any Japanese novel or other prose passage and you will always
see a similar ratio if you can compare that content to an English
translation. William J. Higginson has written that about 12 to
14 syllables in English is equivalent to the 17 sounds of Japanese,
a ratio of about 71 to 82 percent. Others have proposed 10 to 12
English syllables, a ratio of about 59 to 71 percent. The Tanka
International organization in Tokyo advocates for a maximum of
just 21 syllables in English as being equivalent to the 31 sounds of a
traditional Japanese tanka, a ratio of about 68 percent. It therefore
cannot be escaped that, if one is writing 5-7-5 syllables in English,
the poem will simply be longer, fuller, and with excess heft (which
we might call obesity) compared with a typical haiku in Japanese.

The following anecdote may dramatize the difference. John

Stevenson has said he once attended an international Playback
Theater conference in the mid-1990s. He also shared a 5-7-5
English-language haiku (not one of his own) with some of the
Japanese participants who also wrote haiku and in response, they
asked, “Why is it so long?”

Now let’s also consider a haiku example—one of my own that is

indeed long—which, received an honourable mention in the 74th
Bashō Haiku Contest in Iga City, Japan (birthplace of Bashō).
Here’s my poem, followed by the contest’s Japanese translation:
112 Frogpond 44:2

hush of first snow—

a single candle burns
on the mahogany pulpit

初雪やキャンドル一つ祭壇に
hatsuyuki ya kyandoru hitotsu saidan ni

In English, my poem is 4-6-8 syllables, admittedly on the long

side. In Japanese, the translation is 5-7-5 sounds, and includes the
“ya” cutting word to match the cut indicated by the em dash in
English (“ya” is an essentially meaningless term used only in haiku
to indicate a pause, using up one of the 17 Japanese sounds, leaving
what remains to be even leaner). However, the 18-syllable length
in the original English is too long to fit into the 5-7-5 pattern
in Japanese. So, of necessity, the Japanese translation had to cut
words. Loosely, in Japanese, the poem is “first snow— / one candle
/ on the altar.” That may be a better poem, which further bolsters
my point about the leanness of haiku in Japanese compared with
English. The simplicity of the Japanese translation shows how
wordful and perhaps even wordy my original poem is in English.
My main point, though, is not which is better, but how the
English had to be shortened to fit the sound pattern in Japanese.
The translation loses “hush” (which may well be implied, so that’s
okay), as well as “mahogany,” and changes “pulpit” to “altar.” These
changes, except for the use of “altar,” demonstrate why a poem as
long as 17 syllables (and one syllable longer in this case) is too long
compared with Japanese. In English, to put it simply, 17 syllables is
heftier than the 17 sounds of a Japanese haiku. And, by heftier, I
do not mean meatier or richer, but simply obese.

Of course, one could beg the question: Does a haiku in English

have to match or approximate the weight of a haiku in Japanese?
In other words, do they both need to play with the same ball size,
even if the sounds in Japanese cannot be directly translated into
17 syllables in English? One has to say no in order to justify 5-7-5
 Essays 113

syllables as a target for haiku in English. This is partly why I say that
5-7-5 syllables in English is a violation of the Japanese haiku form,
not a preservation of it. But, if you choose to say that 5-7-5 syllables is
your target for haiku in English, seemingly accepting it as a given,
then you have made a compromise. And, if you allow yourself to
make that compromise (and it definitely is, because the poem is in
reality a different length), then why isn’t the “compromise” (from
a 5-7-5 writer’s point of view) to write haiku with fewer than 17
syllables equally allowable? On the surface, then, it seems possible
to argue that one option or the other is a compromise, and that
may well be the case. However, I would suggest that 5-7-5 syllables
in English is the only compromise compared with Japanese. That’s
because it produces a softball, a ball of a different heft, a choice
to write “obese” haiku, no matter how one might try to argue
otherwise. Furthermore, having 17 syllables is an issue without
even accounting for the fact that the syllables can vary so greatly in
English compared with Japanese (compare “strengths” and “radio,”
for example). As has been pointed out before, the word “haiku” itself
is two syllables in English, but counts as three sounds in Japanese.
That alone should serve as a convincing metaphor for the problem
of considering 5-7-5 syllables in English to be equivalent to Japanese
haiku form. But no, it’s a ball of markedly different size, and thus a
departure from the lean art of Japanese haiku. A poem shorter than
17 syllables in English is therefore not “minimalist” at all, but hews
closer to the heft of haiku in Japanese. And, thus, a poem as long as
17 syllables in English is better understood as “maximalist.” If one
chooses to accept the compromise of 5-7-5 syllables in English, that’s
always a personal choice, but it remains a compromise, and one is
still obliged, for the sake of haiku as a literary art, to employ other
techniques that matter more than filling a bigger bucket.

The fact that 17 syllables produce a “softball,” which is larger than

the “baseball” produced in Japanese haiku, is one reason why the
vast bulk of contemporary haiku translations in English do not
conform to a pattern of 5-7-5 syllables. As with writers of original
114 Frogpond 44:2

haiku in English, these translators also seek to hit other targets

usually present in the original Japanese, such as the effective use of
seasonal reference (kigo or season word), a two-part juxtapositional
structure (equivalent to using a kireji or cutting word to divide the
poem in two), and the use of primarily objective sensory images
based in the five senses, among other targets. In addition, the
discipline of hitting all these targets is far greater than merely
counting syllables, which is the most trivial of haiku’s disciplines.
Indeed, if all you aim for in English is to dutifully count out your
17 syllables, at best you end up producing a softball, not a baseball.
It’s a bigger ball, easier to hit, and less dense, and thus used in bush-
league sports, not professional American leagues. Furthermore,
many Western attempts at haiku, such as widely seen on the
internet and social media, miss so many other targets that they
don’t even produce a softball, but poems with little substance or
density, a Wiffle ball. I do not mean to suggest that these Wiffle
ball haiku are childish; rather, I am trying to clarify simply that
their writers are producing a different heft of ball, as are those
who are producing softballs.

Can you still have fun with a Wiffle ball or a softball? Absolutely.
A problem arises, however, if poets playing with these balls believe
they are playing baseball. If they think so, it would seem that their
poems will strike out nearly every time and their players won’t
even know it. Furthermore, their poems won’t translate smoothly
or completely into the traditional Japanese form, as shown with
my “hush of first snow” poem. What works in the sandlot game
won’t fly in the big leagues or even the minor leagues. Nevertheless,
perhaps these more amateur balls are stepping stones to the bigger
leagues, and it’s no wonder that the vast majority of the leading
haiku poets writing literary haiku in English have graduated
through Wiffle balls and softballs to the making of real baseballs.
Quite simply, they have a feeling for the real heft of haiku.
 Essays 115

Michael Dylan Welch has been investigating haiku since 1976. He is a

director for the Haiku North America conference, founder and president of
the Tanka Society of America, co-founder of the American Haiku Archives,
and founder/director of the Seabeck Haiku Getaway and National Haiku
Writing Month. His haiku, essays, and reviews have appeared in hundreds
of journals and anthologies in at least 22 languages. Michael lives in
Sammamish, Washington, where he enjoys racquetball, skiing, travel and
reading. His website is www.graceguts.com.
116 Frogpond 44:2

Contests
2021 Nicholas A. Virgilio Memorial Student Haiku and
Senryu Competition for Grades 7-12
Judged by Tom Clausen and Sandi Pray

This school year has been difficult for students and teachers
alike. Understandable then that the number of submissions for
our annual student haiku contest decreased from a high of 6,000
submissions to the roughly 2,000 submissions that we received this
year. That being said, the judges of this year’s contest still chose six
high-quality haiku to win that would rival poems from any other
year. The students who submitted this year hailed from forty states
plus Puerto Rico and D.C. We also were pleased to read submissions
from international students from thirteen other countries.

Aida Pardo, Grade 8, Atlanta, Georgia

hide and seek

the smell of detergent
on Papi’s shirts

Papi’s closet would be a wondrous place to hide. What surprises me is the

poet’s focus on the scent of his laundry rather than the hold-your-breath
anticipation of being discovered. I feel that Papi is beloved. Is this a fond
memory or perhaps last weekend’s game? So much to ponder in a few
words. —Sandi

As much as I was captivated by the fun memory of various hide-and-seek

times in my life, it was another hidden subtext that made this resonate
even more for me. The reality of hiding someplace is that we suddenly must
be perfectly still, quiet, and in suspense as to how long it might be before we
are found. It is during that time that a great intimacy with our surroundings
is attained. It is in that hiding that we gain an up-close intimacy with our
 Contests 117

surroundings. That is a place where haiku awareness and sensibility begin.

I delighted in this young poet being up close and personal with their Papi’s
shirts! —Tom

Gabby Short, Grade 7, Atlanta, Georgia

harvest moon
corn whispers
the wind’s path

I closed my eyes and was there. This poem speaks to the senses…the touch
and sound of cool wind, the sight of the full moon, the scent of corn husks.
It has a melancholy about it that makes me wonder if the poet was alone.
—Sandi

This poem has an appealing invitation to be out there in such a magical

moment. The whisper of wind creates a natural bridge of some timeless
secret of the harvests everywhere. I like the yūgen sense of beauty calling
from beyond that makes me glad to imagine being there now! —Tom

Amiya Bhattacharrya, Grade 7, Decatur, Georgia

autumn breeze
the cold chains
of the old park swing

I found this poem to be an excellent example of wabi-sabi. Fragment and

phrase together bring feelings of nostalgia for what has gone…maybe just
the recent summer break or the loss of a friend or of fun times past. The
implied feel of cold chains and creaking sound gives this poem great depth.
—Sandi

The happy childhood memories of being in the park and swinging come
alive in this haiku. Yet, the change in seasons is apparent in the cold chains,
118 Frogpond 44:2

giving a hint of harsher weather looming ahead. I liked that the poet gave
the reader the chance to feel their own memories through this poem. As we
outgrow certain childhood pleasures, there remains the desire to remember
and revisit them. Swinging for children has an allure that lasts a lifetime. It
brought back my own memory of swinging so high I felt as if I was reaching
the sky. —Tom

Ustat Sethi, Grade 11, Bangalore, India

eye clinic—
the medic squints
at my prescription

A great observation of the commonplace. What might have been an ordinary

poem about the infamous penmanship of doctors turns with humor to the
medic’s need to squint. Clear and concise, this senryu definitely brings a
smile. —Sandi

This senryu has a familiar truth plain as day! We all have seen plenty
of prescriptions written in hieroglyphic script that is cryptic and puzzling
when it should be absolutely clear and accessible! The wonderful humor of
this being at an eye clinic and prompting a squint, as if that might help
decipher it, makes for an instant smile and sense of insight into another
indelible foible of humanity—poor penmanship! This senryu touches on
our current day attachment to keyboards and the lost art of handwriting
that a generation ago was so valued by many. —Tom

Oshadha Perera, Grade 10 U.S. Equivalent, Invercargill, New Zealand

summer rain
breathing in
the earth’s smell

What a sense of peace this poem evokes. The poet shows great sensitivity
and perceptiveness in a moment that many would overlook as they busy
 Contests 119

themselves with other things. This is a good example of the use of sound
and scent to make the ordinary seem extraordinary. So much said in few
words. —Sandi

What a subtle but indelible sense it is to actually be able to identify the

smell of the earth. Summer is most associated with ease, leisure, and
pleasures, and how entirely fitting that a summer rain would deliver this
sensation. What a lovely communion it is to become acquainted with the
great scent of our mother earth! The pared-down simplicity and immediacy
of this poem is an example of less being more. —Tom

Angelina Georgacopoulos, Grade 11, Tewksbury, Massachusetts

quiet library
dust particles suspended
in a ray of light

This poem evokes an atmosphere of quiet contemplation. Whether taking a

break, hoping for inspiration, or deeply troubled, how often does one stare
at seemingly nothing. The something found within the focus of nothing.
Both sound (lack of) and sight are woven into a poem of narrowed focus
with a hint of wabi-sabi. —Sandi

Dust is likely the smallest sight available to see. It is meaningful to realize

that it is in moments of stillness and quiet when we are able to see such a
sight. I enjoyed being there amongst all the books and in that ray of light
recognizing the “reading” of dust particles; a story for all time. —Tom
120 Frogpond 44:2

Tom Clausen is a lifelong resident of Ithaca, New York, and a member

of the Rt. 9 Haiku Group. He developed an interest in haiku and other
brief poetic forms after realizing he needed more discipline in his writing
attempts. He is married to Berta Gutierrez and they have two children,
Casey and Emma. His books of haiku and tanka include: Autumn Wind
in the Cracks (1994); Unraked Leaves (1995); A Work of Love (Tiny Poems
Press, 1997); Standing Here (1998); Homework (Snapshot Press, 2000);
Being There (Swamp Press, 2005); Growing Late (Snapshot Press, 2006);
Laughing to Myself (Free Food Press, 2013).

Sandi Pray is a retired high school library media specialist living a quiet
life in the wilds of the North Carolina mountains and river wetlands
of North Florida. As a vegan she is a lover of all life and the rhythms
of nature. Sandi’s haiku, haiga, and tanka have appeared in WHA
Haiga, Daily Haiku, Daily Haiga, Simply Haiku, Modern Haiku, AHG,
Frogpond, Cattails, Acorn, The Heron’s Nest, Akitsu Quarterly, Hedgerow
Poems, Brass Bell, Mann Library Daily Haiku, Under the Basho, Seize
the Poem Anthology, DVerse Poetry Anthology, Fragments Anthology,
Skylark, Moonbathing, Bright Stars, Atlas Poetica and Naad Anunaad:
An Anthology of Contemporary World Haiku. She is a past haiga editor
for A Hundred Gourds and is tankart editor for Skylark Tanka Journal.
 Book Reviews 121

Book Reviews

REVIEWED BY ROBERT EPSTEIN

Three Simple Lines: A Writer’s Pilgrimage into the Heart and

Homeland of Haiku memoir by Natalie Goldberg (New World Library,
Novato, CA: 2021). 161 pages, 5.25" x 8.5". Hardcover, perfect bound. ISBN
978-1-60868-697-1. Available from online booksellers.

Natalie Goldberg is a beloved American writing teacher and

memoirist whose Zen-infused Writing Down the Bones has won
her worldwide acclaim. Her latest book, Three Simple Lines: A
Writer’s Pilgrimage into the Heart and Homeland of Haiku, is written in
Goldberg’s inimitable raw, impassioned style and recounts several
trips to Japan (with an interlude involving cancer) that constitute a
unified pilgrimage and reflect Goldberg’s deep love of the Japanese
haiku masters: Bashō, Buson, Issa, and Shiki, as well as Chiyo-ni,
an outstanding eighteenth-century female poet. With travel guides
and companions, Goldberg makes her way from the birthplace of
a poet to a Zen monastery; from a gravesite to the tea garden, and
more. By virtue of her astute powers of observation and penchant
for immediacy, the reader is imperceptibly drawn into Goldberg’s
compelling memoir, feeling like a fellow traveler through Kyoto
and Tokyo, as well as a variety of small mountain villages.

The subtle purpose of Three Simple Lines has everything to do with

the haiku mind, which can easily be missed by the unknowing
reader, hungry to learn about the mechanics of haiku from this
celebrated writing teacher. By virtue of her innocence, candor,
sensitivity, genuineness, openness, and zigzag effort (to name a
few qualities I discern), Goldberg deftly communicates the Zen
art of listening, observing, and intuiting, which, for her, is vital for
writing haiku. In this way, she echoes Bashō.
122 Frogpond 44:2

Goldberg’s reverence for these masters, especially Buson, is moving.

She appreciates his willingness to be more open and self-revealing
than she finds Bashō to be. Here she is at Buson’s gravesite:

I prostrate three times before the grave. The scattered

leaves and needles strewn on the ground smell rich and
musky as I lower my head to the dirt...I stand up, suddenly
shy. ‘What can I say?’ I tell Buson. ‘Your haiku have touched
me, centuries later, in another country. Thank you.’ I fold
my hands over my chest, do a standing bow.

Listen to Goldbergʼs poignant take on Shiki who brought haiku

into the modern world despite the ravages of tuberculosis, which
ultimately took his life:

… even in his suffering, he is able to ponder the cockscombs—

how many, fourteen or fifteen? He accepts ambiguity, a
high mark for haiku. He accepts the mind of uncertainty
and expresses it, making this haiku modern: conventional,
banal, unassuming, mortal, almost like a whisper.

Catching herself trying to power through her own murky feelings

to some kind of poetic clarity, Goldberg transparently stumbles
on an important insight: “Any emotion one feels, pure and simple,
moves, passes, if accepted. Earlier I was trying to dominate my
confusion, make it clear. Haiku reminds me that it clears on its
own, with patience, over time.” For anyone who understands
haiku, this is not only helpful advice, it is a precious teaching.

The reader learns it was Allen Ginsberg who introduced a young

Natalie to haiku poetry in a class she took with the author of Howl
in 1976. She vividly recalls what he said about haiku: “…ʻupon
hearing one, your mind experiences a small sensation of spaceʼ—he
paused; I leaned in breathless—ʻwhich is nothing less than God.ʼ”
This is language that the Beat poets, including Jack Kerouac,
 Book Reviews 123

used—vast, primal, pulsating, crisp. It is not typically the language

of contemporary English-language haiku, but she learned it well
and puts it to exceptional use in Three Simple Lines.

To her credit, Goldberg realizes during one of her trips to Japan—

decades after the Ginsberg class—that she has been constrained
by her mentor’s description of haiku which she enthusiastically
absorbed. I was startled by her self-disclosure, which one would
never hear from a teacher preoccupied with guarding her well-
established reputation:

For years I believed in Ginsberg’s idea that ‘this little

sensation of space, nothing less than God’ is the only
true haiku test. But what if God exists quietly, without
sensation or without space? What if God takes many
different forms?

Goldberg continues: “Sitting again on the ratty, half-collapsed

outdoor chair at the pond, I think, I’ve held myself hostage with
Ginsberg’s ideas since 1976.”

This candor extends to Goldberg’s own haiku writing. Lest anyone

assume she has rid herself of all insecurity, Goldberg publicly admits:

Please don’t imagine that my decades of writing practice

and Zen meditation have silenced or fully pacified the
angry self-critics in my head. That’s not how things work.
I’m just much better at managing those voices.

Back home, she joins a monthly haiku group, co-led by the well-
respected poet, scholar, and former editor, Charles Trumbull.
Goldberg readily acknowledges that she has a lot to learn about
the Japanese form despite her widely-recognized accomplishments
as writer, painter, and teacher. She submits to multiple haiku
readings and critiques and confesses with humor and a hint of self-
124 Frogpond 44:2

deprecation: “When I read my brown sock haiku [On my brown

socks / a single black butterfly / flaps its wings], it falls like a dead horse
on dead ears.” Incredulous, I also read: “Eventually, what I begin to
enjoy most is simply not knowing how to do it. I haul in my haiku
each month, and they usually land like lead. I like not being good, not
having a clue” [my emphasis added].

This is not an ordinary reaction or rationalization; it is an

extraordinary response by someone who is wide open to everything,
including pain, frustration, embarrassment, disappointment, and
even cancer. This is the Zen Way merging with the Haiku Way. The
fruit of this integration is a poem, the revelation of truth that
Goldberg shares with the group which thrills her:

Fast mountain creek

In dark, cold stones
my original face

Upon hearing some affirmative comments, Goldberg writes: “I

burst inside, like a firecracker. It’s been three decades since I felt
like this after finishing a poem. I want to do somersaults, flips,
across the room.”

Goldberg’s book is very much focused on the inextricable

connection that she sees between haiku and Zen. English-language
haiku critics will not be happy about this; for the past two decades
or more, they have been vociferously arguing that haiku has little
or nothing to do with Zen, in particular, or Buddhism, in general.

Haiku poets seeking formal guidance and direction in the art

of haiku writing may not find exactly what they are looking for
in Three Simple Lines. Although there are plenty of haiku penned
by the masters and a handful of poems by fellow participants in
Goldberg’s haiku group, Three Simple Lines is not a how-to manual
 Book Reviews 125

(with the exception of “A Haiku Lesson” written by Beth Howard,

one of her students, in the book’s last chapter). Nor will one find a
scholarly critique of contemporary English-language haiku; there
is, for example, no mention at all of innovative developments such
as gendai (modern), concrete, or minimalist haiku.

It is also true that virtually no one in English-language haiku talks

about lineage, but Goldberg does. She says forthrightly: “Haiku is a
true lineage.” Not so long ago, the late Canadian poet, Eric Amann,
would have understood what she meant, as would the late Robert
Spiess, longtime editor of Modern Haiku. So would the award-
winning poet, artist, and Zen practitioner, Ron C. Moss. Goldberg’s
love of the Japanese masters puts her squarely within such a lineage.

What is the foundation of lineage? Love. It is love and devotion

that impel one to undertake a pilgrimage, and it is love that
prompts a devotee of haiku to pay homage to those who pioneered
the Japanese poetic form. This is precisely why Natalie Goldberg
reveals her true heart in all its innocence and spontaneity in Three
Simple Lines. In a discussion over Bashō’s last poem, Sick on a journey
/ my dreams wander / over withered fields, with her late teacher’s dear
friend, Harada Roshi, his son, and her travel companion, Mitsue,
the latter offers a deeper understanding of “withered fields.”
Goldberg has a sudden realization: “I take a step back. Tears
spring to my eyes. On his deathbed, Bashō embraced the whole
impermanent field of the universe.”

In her love of lineage and all it implies, Goldberg “shines one corner
of the world” to quote Zen teacher Suzuki Roshi. Her message, her
teaching? Just this: If you care deeply and live fully in the small,
fleeting moments, your very life will be a poem. This is the Way of
Haiku, dating back to Bashō, Buson, Issa, and Shiki. I am certain
all four haiku masters—plus Chiyo-ni and Allen Ginsberg—would
bow deeply in recognition of Goldberg’s Great Effort. I bow, too. 
126 Frogpond 44:2

REVIEWED BY KRISTEN LINDQUIST

Clay Moon haiku by Thomas Powell (Snapshot Press, Ormskirk, UK:

2020). 96 pages, 5″ x 7.75". Perfect softbound. ISBN 978-1-903543-48-1. $28
from snapshotpress.co.uk.

Thomas Powell’s first full-length collection of haiku contains 88

haiku, one to a page, with no sections or divisions to intrude upon
a lovely long ramble through what I imagine to be the countryside
of Northern Ireland, where he lives, or Wales, where he’s from.
This sense of moving along a path is also enhanced by Powell’s
frequent use of ellipses.

With the book’s title and the knowledge that, in addition to being
a fine haiku poet, Powell also makes pottery, easy comparisons
come to mind. The art of shaping clay and shaping a poem both
require careful craftsmanship and a good eye for detail. And in
their own way, each are hands-on activities. Several poems in this
collection directly refer to pottery-making, and a strong sense
comes through of an artistic interplay between the two activities.
I envision lines of haiku coming into Powell’s head while his hands
are at work shaping a bowl or jug on the wheel or while he looks
around his studio.

hand-thrown white glaze dries

another bowl for fruit on a porous jug . . .
I’ll never taste midwinter dawn

And with his potter’s mind, Powell takes an age-old haiku trope
and brings it down to earth, as it were, transforming the so-often
romanticized moon into a lump of clay that he can get his hands
onto. And what does he make? This book, full of “old shadows”
that lengthen and linger.

clay moon casting old shadows

 Book Reviews 127

Indeed, the rural topography of the poems set outside the pottery
studio feels ancient and rough, as if Powell were tapping into
some primeval spirit manifested there in rowanberries, loughs
and bogs, wildflowers, and birds. The farm animals out to pasture
also seem to come from an earlier time:

slowing train . . . buttercups

the stare of a bullock the haltered pony
standing in a stream on its back

At the heart of this stark landscape is an unexpected beauty evoked

through deeply poignant, wabi-sabi imagery: A hearth warmed
only by sunlight, the past-peak fragrance of heather, a “derelict
mill” that shelters pheasants, fallen roof slates, various insects, a
new gate that already creaks, the inside-out ear of a “giddy” dog
(in one of the most joyful poems in the whole book). Every poem
in the book is an exquisite example.

bleak dawn . . . creaking porch roof . . .

closed dandelions line a pill millipede follows
the towpath the dustbin’s curves

fading snow budding trees

in the drumlin’s shadow a giddy dog’s ear
a figure walking inside out

Even the human world represented in these haiku hints of bleak

prospects. But this isn’t a bleak book at all; each of these pellucid
haiku is an object lesson in how to find poetry—and thus some
consolation—in the natural world, even if “the natural world” is
simply a tiny arthropod wandering through one’s pottery studio:

redundancy notice . . . a day to myself . . .

an autumn millipede I follow the river
treks through clay dust back to its source
128 Frogpond 44:2

exorcising this head work prospects . . .

of nonsense . . . I search the sky
sedge warbler’s song for yesterday’s swallows

A question I’ve been asked several times at gatherings of writers:

“If you could take one book to a desert island, what would it be?”
Well, when I received this book to review, I did actually take it
to a (nearly) deserted island, where I read it every day. It held up
very well to the “desert island challenge,” its pensive mood and
thoughtful images perfectly suited to wandering trails alone in a
remote place of stark natural beauty. But one doesn’t need to be
familiar with the kind of landscape that inspired these haiku to
appreciate and be moved by the skilled artisanship that shaped
them into being. This is a stunning book that I plan to keep close
at hand for a long time. 

REVIEWED BY TOM CLAUSEN

Sirens and Rain haiku by Barry George (Accents Publishing, Lexington,

KY: 2020). 79 pages, 5.5" x 8.5". Glossy cover, perfect softbound. ISBN
978-1-936628-62-9. $16 available from accents-publishing.com or online
booksellers.

In Sirens and Rain, Barry George serves as a masterful haiku

reporter on the streets of his home city, Philadelphia. The cover
photograph, taken by the author and depicting his center city
neighborhood, is the starting point for a celebration of the city
and its people in 100 indelible haiku and senryu that are by turns
poignant, humorous, subtle, delightful, sublime, and insightful.
It is an inspired extension of George’s 30-page chapbook from
2010, Wrecking Ball and Other Urban Haiku, from which two poems
are republished, so this gathers much of the wonderful work he’s
written in the interim with some standouts having placed in
contests, such as the following poem:
 Book Reviews 129

the stylist
rinses away
the sound of her voice

The collection is divided into five sections: “Heat Warning,”

“Cicada Season,” “Moon Gazing,” “Midwinter Sun,” and “Bowing
to Dandelions.” There are one or two haiku per page, providing
a relaxed presentation that creates ample space for appreciating
each haiku individually and in concert with the whole book that
has an amazing cohesiveness despite the wide-ranging subject
matter. Window washers, street vendors, police, homeless vets, as
well as a dentist, a comptroller, a school crossing guard, a waitress,
and a diva are not the only Philadelphians depicted:

musty and somewhat fall morning—

worn around the edges— sequins sparkle
the used bookseller on the girls’ hijabs

For anyone who might doubt or wonder about a city being a viable
source of one’s haiku, this book is a revelation and a reality check that
haiku are indeed everywhere. There is great instruction, encouragement,
and inspiration in this collection for anyone living in an urban setting
to recognize how bountiful the “nature” of a city can be. Throughout
Sirens and Rain, there are stellar examples of haiku to be found in parks,
alleys, shops, and literally any place you may find yourself:

South Philly in spring— rower’s statue—

the hoagie shop’s signed picture raindrops hang
of Stallone from his oars

In these and other poems, George displays a sensitivity to his

subjects that is warmly rewarding. There are haiku of beautiful
subtlety that are the work of a poet with a keen eye attuned to his
environment and its details:
130 Frogpond 44:2

long afternoon— sidewalk pigeons

again at the blinds scattering
the wasp’s shadow the day moon

Philadelphia is a city that is known for being as tough as it is

soulful, and George reveals both sides. The time you spend reading
an accomplished collection of haiku is a great gift to yourself, and
this is a book I highly recommend. 

BRIEFLY REVIEWED BY RANDY BROOKS

Without Syntax haiku by Lee Gurga (Modern Haiku Press, Champaign,

IL: 2020). 32 pages, 5.5" x 4.25". Four-color card covers, saddle stitched.
ISBN 978-0-9600855-3-8. $3 from modernhaiku.org.

Without Syntax is a mini chapbook featuring 18 haiku by Lee Gurga.

This collection is missing the author’s name, but I can assure you
that it is by Lee Gurga, and notably, that it received an honorable
mention in the Touchstone Distinguished Book Awards. The book
is arranged for a pleasant reading experience with one-line haiku
on the left pages and vertical haiku (one word per line) on the right
pages. The title comes from this vertical poem: without / syntax /
the / bare / skin / of / dawn. I prefer the vertically-arranged haiku
because this format slows the poem down and lets us take in the
significance of each added word. In this title poem, we end up
with our bare feet planted squarely on dawn. This is an excellent
title poem because Gurga is a master of playing with the tension
between language and sensation. Sometimes his poems push an
abstract word into sensation as in this haiku: an unspoken assumption
tracks through the petals. But in the best of his work, a technical word
becomes a spiritual, life-giving mystery. For example, I have always
admired this fresh perspective: floating in the sonogram summer moon.
Sometimes we get lost in words and find ourselves in the sensations
of living. I will end with this one: looking up from my thesaurus dusk.
 Book Reviews 131

Closed Systems of Joy haiku by Chris Gordon (Eugene, OR: 2020). 24

pages, 5.5" x 8.5". Saddle stitched. No ISBN. Available from the author at
2115 Churchill Street, Eugene, OR 97405.

I don’t understand why, but Closed Systems of Joy is published with

the title page at the back of the book. The first 18 haiku (from the
back forward) all start with the phrase “the virus,” so perhaps the
book is laid out backwards because 2020 has been such an upside-
down year? Here are three samples of Gordon’s viral haiku: (1) the
virus / I adjust the hole / in my sock, (2) the virus / they steal our / common
ideals, and (3) the virus / superstitions / don’t count. Recurring images
from the pandemic pop up in subsequent poems such as today / at
the market / a few masks. Here is the title poem: closed systems of joy /
under the fog / a thin band of light. I like the too-house-bound feeling
of this one: in the end / they move by themselves / slippers. We get one
apocalyptic haiku: good company / at the end of / the world. I close with
the paranoia of socks: her socks / tell me / she’s angry. What a year!

Light and Counterlight haiku by Mark Miller (Ginninderra Press, Port

Adelaide, SW, Australia: 2020). 88 pages, 5" x 7.75". Four-color card covers,
perfect softbound. ISBN 978-1-76109-044-8. $20 from ginninderrapress.
com or online booksellers.

Mark Miller has been writing and receiving awards for haiku for
over 30 years, but this is his first published collection. Light and
Counterlight includes 110 of his haiku arranged in clusters of 6 to
9. The general movement of the collection is through the seasons,
starting with this spring haiku: breaking light / the pale vibrato / of
cherry blossoms. Here are some of his best haiku progressing through
the seasons. I like the mystery in this one: whispering brook / so many
secrets / lost to the sea. Two from summer: (1) midday heat / the old collie
/ laps the shade and (2) ongoing drought / the stillness / of the rope swing. I
especially like this holiday haiku: midnight / a lone ferry fills the harbour
/ with Christmas lights. Here’s a haunting autumn poem: skeletal leaf
132 Frogpond 44:2

/ giving back all / that it has taken. I’ll end with this observant haiku:
midwinter forest / on milkweed the sighing / of a monarch’s wings. We
should be grateful that Miller has gathered so many of his award-
winning haiku into this collection.

Rochester Area Haiku Group 2020 Members’ Anthology edited by

Michael Ketchek, Catherine Ann Nowaski and Carolyn Dancy (Rochester
Area Haiku Group, Rochester, NY: 2020). 38 pages, 5" x 8.5". Four-color
card covers, perfect softbound. No ISBN.

This anthology features haiku, tanka, and haibun by ten members

of the Rochester Area Haiku Group: Pamela A. Babusci, Jerome
Cushman, Carolyn Dancy, Frank Judge, Michael Ketchek, Deb
Koen, Catherine Ann Nowaski, Tom Painting, Lee Strong, and
Deanna Tiefenthal. Each poet is featured on two facing pages, with
a brief biography about the author. Most of the sample poems have
been recently published in various haiku journals. Here are a few
outstanding examples. Pamela Babusci starts with a haiga: enough /
one rice bowl / two chopsticks. From Jerome Cushman, we get: barroom
tango / the toe of her shoe / licks his leg. Here is a sunny memory from
Michael Ketchek: stone chimney in the woods / all that’s left / of the past.
Catherine Ann Nowaski also time travels in this haiku: claw-footed
tub / I step back / into time. One of Tom Painting’s haiku invites us
to take a little voyage: Indian summer / a tethered rowboat / nudges the
dock. Obviously, this is a talented group of haiku writers! 

BRIEFLY REVIEWED BY LAURIE D. MORRISSEY

The Years That Went Missing haiku by Susan Antolin (Backbone Press,
Durham, NC: 2020). 26 pages, 7" x 5". Glossy covers, perfect softbound.
ISBN 978-0-9994659-5-0. $9 from backbonepress.org.

The first-place winner of the first haiku chapbook contest

sponsored by Backbone Press, an independent publisher of poetry
chapbooks, The Years That Went Missing also received a Touchstone
 Book Reviews 133

Distinguished Book Award for 2020. Antolin is an award-winning

poet who has served for the past decade as editor of Acorn: A
Journal of Contemporary Haiku. Her first published poetry collection
was Artichoke Season (2009). The Years That Went Missing, selected
by Michael Dylan Welch out of more than 50 Backbone Press
chapbook entries, contains 52 haiku and senryu. The poems are
arranged two to a page and, with the exception of two monoku,
are all fairly traditional three-line haiku. This is an attractive,
accessible volume that is a pleasure to read. For the cover, the
poet selected an abstract painting by Huynah Kim, an artist who
describes the central theme of her work as simply “wonderment.”
It is a fitting invitation to a haiku collection that brims with poems
that magnify ordinary moments: chattering finches, the call of an
owl, an intimate moment between husband and wife. Age and
failing health (of self, parents, or a pet) are recurring themes, as in
this favorite: hospital bedside / the crisp fold / of an unread newspaper.
I also love the potent imagery and endless possibilities of insides
spilling / from the dumpling / farewell dinner. I like to contemplate the
flow of haiku in a collection, and this one opens with end of summer
/ I pull the rope ladder up / behind me, which suggests a desire to be
separate and alone. It ends on a cosmic note: night sky / one of those
stars might be / the reset button. To read the haiku that gives this
collection its title, you’ll have to obtain a copy. Recommended.

The Nothing That Is haiku by David Kāwika Eyre (Red Moon Press,
Winchester, VA: 2021). 150 pages, 4.25" x 6.5". Four-color card covers,
perfect softbound. ISBN 978-1-947271-67-8. $20 from redmoonpress.com.

David Kāwika Eyre is a master of brevity and precision. None of

the haiku in his second published collection contains more than
ten words, and a good many have just two or three. Even then,
they may consist of the same word three times (as in wave / wave /
wave)—or abbreviations instead of words. Among my favorites is
his jan. / etc. / dec. Spare and often playful, they blend simplicity and
complexity. The artwork complements the haiku well, especially
134 Frogpond 44:2

the cover art, which neatly represents the title—a shadow, a

nothing that is something. The paintings (five, not including the
cover) are the work of the poet’s daughter, Emma Eyre. With the
exception of the cover painting, they are two-page spreads, rich
and atmospheric, deeply textured in a way that contrasts with the
lightness and brevity of the haiku. The haiku are printed one per
page in light blue, and the page numbers are pink. Color, here, is a
nothing that is something—and for me, it is something distracting.
However, I appreciate page numbers; they make it easier to return
to favorite haiku. There are a lot of tasty extras in this book: a
quote from Wallace Stevens to open the collection, a three-page
compendium of quotes “in gratitude to some who have beckoned,”
and an acknowledgments section that gives a nod to the editors of
the journals in which the haiku first appeared. Other outstanding
haiku contained herein: (1) kneading dough / the rhythm of / a yellow
blouse, (2) spring light / the scent of delicacy, (3) warm wind / the tip of
a cat’s tail / dreaming, and (4) cream pie / for better / for worse. I value
a haiku collection for not only the quality of the haiku, but also
for how it makes me feel and whether it inspires me to write. The
haiku in this book are evocative; they lingered and made me wish
to return. This collection made me notice things that are nothing,
yet something, e.g., empty boxes, scents, spaces within a poem,
zero, pauses in music, the hole in my sock.

Tending Gumbo haiku by Bill Cooper (Red Moon Press, Winchester,

VA: 2020). 100 pages, 4.25" x 6.5". Glossy covers, perfect softbound. ISBN
978-1-947271-58-6. $15 from redmoonpress.com.

Bill Cooper has published seven previous books of haiku, six with
Red Moon Press. In his latest, he presents 122 haiku in four sections:
“Dripping Oar,” “Cypress Shade,” “Faint Trumpet,” and “Midnight
Bug.” The poems are arranged consistently throughout, with two
haiku on the left-hand page and one on the right. Not unlike
gumbo, the collection contains a combination of ingredients,
in this case haiku and senryu with a variety of themes. As you
 Book Reviews 135

might guess from the title, there’s a good-sized serving of New

Orleans here, offering up not only gumbo, but jambalaya, Sazerac
(a drink I admit I had to look up), Mardi Gras, okra, tilapia, and
the natural environment of the southern coastal lands. The title
haiku is a delicious monoku: tending gumbo the blend of our voices.
Cooper’s nature haiku elegantly link human experience with the
natural world. Examples include (1) shrouded crescent / a heron nudges
mud / through her grooming claw, (2) snowy owl / dune chill in the taste
/ of a wild cranberry, and (3) dripping oar / the baby tarpon / rolls in
a swell. The book is in memory of the late poet and editor Paul
W. MacNeil, who would most likely have enjoyed these. Cooper’s
senryu about childhood have an emotional resonance that lingers:
counting best friends / her second mittens falls / to the snow. A couple are
more obscure, such as green marble floor / nor is rye bread / the answer
and the one-word mir-a-lago.

Breaking My Journey haiku by Gregory Piko (Red Moon Press,

Winchester, VA: 2020). 87 pages, 5.25" x 8". Glossy covers, perfect softbound.
ISBN 978-1-947271-61-6. $15 from redmoonpress.com.

Breaking My Journey is a collection of nearly 100 haiku and several

poems in related forms. The cover image, designed by Tasmanian
visual artist and poet Ron C. Moss, is of a tree against a colorful
sky (perhaps a gum tree, native to Australia). The striking image is
echoed occasionally between pages of text, giving pleasant breaks
to the reader’s journey. Many of these haiku evoke Australian
settings, but it is not necessary to live Down Under, or even know
what a currawong is, to sense the mood in monochrome morning
/ currawongs busy themselves / in the drifting fog. Nine poems are
monoku, including river bend the curve of a raven’s cry, as well as
coldpond, a highly evocative haiku in a single inventive word. One
of my favorite haiku in the collection is the two-line a quiet kind of
love / autumn crocus. The collection is enhanced by Piko’s use of the
honkadori technique. Haiku Commentary Online’s Haikai Glossary
defines honkadori as “…a poem alluding to another poem. They are
136 Frogpond 44:2

commonly written out of respect and are nods to carrying on a

tradition of themes.” Piko’s haibun “Near a Station of the Metro”
refers to Ezra Pound’s famous one-image poem. In his end notes,
Piko explains that one haiku relates to Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s
novel, One Hundred Years of Solitude, and others relate to poems by
Matsuo Bashō, William Carlos Williams, and Cor van den Heuvel.
The collection includes Piko’s 2010 Touchstone Award winning
haiku: a crow at dusk / ink seeps deeper / into the page. Other favorites
include (1) breaking / my journey / this pine and (2) snowy owl / I’ll leave
this world / alone.

A Sonic Boom of Stars: 2020 Southern California Haiku Study

Group Anthology edited by Beki Reese and Susan Rogers (Southern
California Haiku Study Group, Temple City, CA: 2020). 120 pages, 8.5" x
5.5". ISBN 978-0-578-64794-4. $18 from Southern California Haiku Study
Group, 10529 Olive Street, Temple City, CA, 91780.

The Southern California Haiku Study Group has published an

anthology nearly every year since 2001. This book presents the
work of 83 poets (mostly in the Southern California Haiku Study
Group, but also some in Haiku San Diego), each of whom had one
to four haiku selected by co-editors Beki Reese and Susan Rogers.
Moderator Deborah P Kolodji opens the attractively-produced
volume with a discussion of the book’s title and cover art. “A Sonic
Boom of Stars” comes from a haiku by Kimberly Esser (broken
window / a sonic boom / of stars) “who uses synesthesia to link the
sound of a space shuttle landing to the silent visual experience of
seeing a profusion of stars in the night sky.” In her introduction,
Kolodji also pays tribute to five members who “joined the stars” in
the past year, including Jerry Ball who founded the study group in
1997. Some of the finest haiku in the volume are Esser’s, but haiku
by many others stand out. Examples include Kolodji’s coral necklace
/ the stories / we hand down, Naia’s dandelions / the desire to see / the
world, Genie Nakano’s cold winter— / our legs candycane / around each
other, and all four of Tad Wojnicki’s haiku, including beach sunrise /
 Book Reviews 137

daylight crawls / crab by crab. Stevie Strang’s super moon / the day after
/ still the super moon is outstanding for its originality and gentle wit.
Her cosmic artwork, which enhances the title haiku, graces the
anthology’s cover. In addition to haiku in English, the collection
includes several foreign-language haiku, and haibun by 17 poets.
The anthology, in Kolodji’s words, “brings focus to quintessential
images of life in Southern California.” However, as an anthology
containing more than 200 haiku organized alphabetically by the
poets’ last names, this collection covers a wide range of subject
matter and emotions. It features both longtime and newer
participants of the study group with the result that some of the
poems are not as original and inspiring as others. The editors’
affection for the study group and their enthusiasm for the project
are evident. Reese and Rogers put their personal stamp on this
collection through their thoughtful selections and layout, and
their decision to include a section of window-themed haiku
in an otherwise un-themed volume. They clearly enjoyed their
collaboration, and readers will enjoy the result. 

BRIEFLY REVIEWED BY KRISTEN LINDQUIST

I Wish edited by Stephen Henry Gill (Hailstone Haiku Circle, Japan:

2020). 104 pages, 4.125" x 5.75". Perfect softbound. ISBN 978-4-9911809-0-
3. $17. Contact Hitomi Suzuki at indigoapple28@gmail.com for details of
ordering the book.

This twentieth-anniversary collection of the Hailstone Haiku Circle,

founded by editor Stephen Gill (Tito), offers many diverse voices in
a small package. It features 218 English-language haiku by 57 poets
living in the Kansai region of Japan where Bashō and Buson came
from. Each member has their own page containing 1-4 three-line
or four-line haiku. The dense little book, which might have been
better served by a larger format, also chronicles what the group has
been up to since its last book, Persimmon, came out in 2018. “Roller
Coaster,” a long haiku sequence with many sections, becomes the
138 Frogpond 44:2

best kind of group therapy through its poignant haiku commentary

on various large-scale calamities—culminating, of course, with the
coronavirus pandemic. The book concludes with an “In Memoriam”
section, helpful “Notes” to explain some of the Japanese references
in the preceding poems, an “Afterword” by member Duro Jaiye on
the influence of Bashō, and an events timeline for this very active
group. To absorb so many diverse haiku by so many poets requires
multiple readings. The haiku that stuck in my head after each re-
reading included Spring in the air / a small fee to enter / the Church of
Light by Jaiye, Summer earthquake / ground spangled with glass, / sky full
of stars by Mizuho Shibuya, and this timely pandemic offering, On
the pine branch / a snake’s sloughed skin— / lockdown eased by Yaeno
Azuchi. To celebrate the publication of I Wish, the group held a
kukai in spring 2021 during which members shared their three
favorite haiku from the anthology. The top two haiku serve as good
examples of the overall quality of the collection: (1) the winner, Like
a Kabuki actor / an old persimmon tree / posing alone (Hitomi Suzuki),
and (2) the runner-up, This colour / squeezed from sky and earth, / a
tinted leaf falls (Miki Kotera).

Seabeck Reunion: Tenth Anniversary Anthology edited by Michael

Dylan Welch (Haiku Northwest Press, Bellevue, WA: 2020). Foreword by
John Stevenson. 132 pages, 7" x 10". Perfect bound. ISBN 978-1-953092-00-
7. $18 from online booksellers.

Many haiku practitioners, myself included, were able to join the

ranks of Seabeck Haiku Getaway attendees when, due to the
Covid-19 pandemic, the annual conference was held virtually
in the fall of 2020. Participants were given a slide-show tour of
the grounds led by co-founder Michael Dylan Welch who also
shared various haiku written at or about the campus in Seabeck,
Washington, where the in-person getaway had taken place annually
for the previous 12 years. This anthology serves as a similar, yet even
more comprehensive tour of Seabeck’s first ten years, from 2008
 Book Reviews 139

through 2017. Also led by Welch, the extended literary tour is as

much an interesting glimpse into the flavor and traditions of this
significant haiku gathering as it is a showcase of its participants’
creativity. You don’t have to have been there to appreciate the
quality and diversity of the 172 haiku and senryu included. The
selections open with two poems each by the ten featured guests
from the first decade, including this one by Penny Harter: migrating
butterflies / cover the names— / war memorial. Four main sections then
offer poems written by the 2017 attendees. The first, “It Happened
At Seabeck,” focuses on the gathering’s activities, offering a sense
of the event’s physical setting as well as its often playful tone:
after sumi-e / the glide of a mud shark / in the lagoon (Jacquie Pearce).
“Mountain Clouds” presents miscellaneous poems that didn’t fit
into the other sections. The season when Seabeck happens each
year inspires the haiku in “Autumn Again”: early autumn even in
sadness morning star (Terran Campbell). “In Good Taste” celebrates
the sense of taste, the theme of the 2017 gathering. These four main
sections are followed, delightfully, by “Tango,” an erotic rengay.
The final section presents the winners of the 2017 Seabeck kukai.
Here’s the first-place poem by Dianne Garcia: deviled eggs / seasoned
with paprika / and mom’s opinions. Even more poems are included
in Welch’s afterword, in which he provides detailed narratives on
each of the first ten years of Seabeck. In addition to stirring the
memories of past attendees, these informative highlights may also
serve as great inspiration for activity and presentation ideas for
one’s own haiku group or gathering. And they certainly made me
hope to be able to attend Seabeck in person someday. As Welch
says, “[W]e gather at Seabeck to share and discuss haiku each year
because we need each other.” We read such anthologies for the
same reason.

Staring at the Midnight Sky haiga by Mark Teaford (Red Moon Press,
Winchester, VA: 2020). 128 pages, 10" x 7". Perfect softbound. ISBN 978-1-
947271-65-4. $30 from redmoonpress.com.
140 Frogpond 44:2

This striking collection of photo-haiga features haiku, senryu,

and tanka paired with black-and-white or sepia photographs. The
format is large enough to properly appreciate the photographic
images, all of which were shot and edited by Teaford. The
photos were taken in various places around the world, yet none
of them feature exotic travel scenes which might overpower the
accompanying poems. The haiku quiet dignity / above all else / giraffe
browsing, for example, is not paired with anything resembling an
African landscape, but rather an image of a narrow city alleyway.
With haiga, there’s a fine line between the poem being either too
overtly connected to the image or so far from it as to render the
pairing surreal. Most of the haiga in this book are on that line,
provoking a broader range of meaningful associations for the
reader/viewer with only a few pairings feeling obvious or too far
out there to be fully appreciated. On an image of what could be
either moss on stone or a view of a palm forest from the air, for
example: what I should / have known /…obituary. Even with the less
successful pieces, the two parts each have something to offer on
their own; many of the photographs easily stand alone as art,
and a number of the poems have been previously published. In
his “Introduction,” Teaford says, “I’m a firm believer that there’s
untold beauty in the world around us if we only take the time
to notice. Of course, there are also images that are thought-
provoking in other ways, and again we need to notice them so
we can learn from them.” Spoken like a true photographer. And
a true haikai poet. Teaford’s cropping and emphasis on texture,
contrast, and detail successfully mirror the techniques used in his
poems. The works cover a range of evocative topics within four
sections—“Relationships,” “Life Today”, “Health & Medicine,” and
“Nature”—and feature both organic and architectural images. He
doesn’t shy away from politics or the tougher aspects of humanity:
(1) social distance / someone’s name / no longer hyphenated and (2) shot
in the head thrown on a fire / government said / it was suicide. There is
much to spend time with in this fine collection. 
 Book Reviews 141

BRIEFLY REVIEWED BY BRUCE ROSS

Journey haibun by Zane Parks (Privately-printed: 2020). 56 pages, 6" x

9". Glossy cream cover, perfect softbound. ISBN 978-6781-7992-2. $7 from
lulu.com.

Zane Parks’s Journey focuses on the life of city folks. This collection
expresses itself in the sensibility of urban reality, often in a
humorous way. These haibun have appeared in many haiku journals,
including Frogpond, Contemporary Haibun Online, and Modern Haiku.
A good example is the concluding haiku of “Celebration,” which
like many of his haibun, ends with a humorous haiku, like the end
of a joke. Here on his birthday, his roommate gives the author and
his girlfriend some privacy: peace march / we exchange the sign / and
the baby. Another example is “Easter Chicks, in which the author
and his brother get Easter chicks that are painted purple for Easter
and quickly grow up and peck at his mother’s feet while she hangs
the wash. It concludes with the following haiku: mom happy /
with the new craze / pet rocks. In his “Submission,” Parks imagines,
after sending a submission, what the rejection letter would be,
which should be amusing to many of us. Basically, Journey is an
entertaining read you will come back to from time to time.

Pilgrimage haibun by Keith Polette (Red Moon Press, Winchester, VA:

2020). 94 pages, 4.5" x 6.5". Four-color card covers, perfect softbound. ISBN
978-1-947271-69-2. $15 from redmoonpress.com.

Keith Polette’s Pilgrimage frames his haibun on impressionistic

fables created from ordinary life, phrasing them with poetic
metaphors and literary and other references, including William
Blake, Ernest Hemingway, Van Gogh, Mark Twain, Robert Frost,
and Franz Kafka. For example, in “Wheatfield With Crows,” after
examining the symbolism of the mass of crows, the dilemma of
their destroying the wheat field is turned into the concluding
142 Frogpond 44:2

haiku: foreclosure / feeding the scarecrow / to the fire. Another example,

both humorous and philosophical, is “Poet Laureate” about a
homeless man accompanied by his dog. The haiku is a cardboard
sign he had written on: invisible man / needing spare change / to change.
Some of these haibun have appeared in a variety of well-known
and lesser-known journals. All in all, a fine collection of poeticized
fables that you will enjoy.

Bar Resbel haibun by Bouwe Brouwer (The Old Sailor, Sneek, The
Netherlands: 2021). 29 pages, 14 x 21 cm. Four-color card covers, saddle
stitched, limited edition of 25, numbered and signed by the author. 15 Euro
from bouwebrouwer.com.

Each of its 14 sections, the first one beginning with the author’s
arrival, is accompanied by a color photograph facing the text. The
majority of the sections are centered on the bar of this work’s
title and descriptions of the activities of those who happened
to be in the bar at that time. Bar Resbel’s tone and approach is
in fact based upon the author’s favorite writer, J.D. Salinger. In
the chapter “Marbles,” the narrator quotes a line from Salinger’s
Seymour: An Introduction. Though the prose of each chapter
and how they are focused and expressed is very reminiscent of
Salinger, each one, as in many haibun, is concluded with a haiku,
some of which are expressed like traditional haiku—for example,
residential apartment— / in every window / a sunset. Many of the
chapters are also funny stories: Two brothers run the bar. The
author overhears the older brother talking to a regular customer
that their father passed away and left them a bottle of wine that
hadn’t been opened. The brother opened the bottle and found
it had become undrinkable. In a particularly humorous section
titled “Game,” the bartender, Nesto, is remembering a childhood
memory when he stayed home and played fencing by himself
with two knitting needles and stabs at one hand with the other
while also trying to defend himself with the first hand. In another
amusing chapter, an older American writer says, “Sometimes I
 Book Reviews 143

would like to do something differently. I get up in the morning

and tell myself: today I will write a poem. Maybe a travel story,
sometimes autobiographical. I’ll just start and I will see where it
will take me. But every time it turns into a detective story.” In
a Salinger-like humor, the cabdriver, Fidel, tells the author he is
upset because “he’s taking care of a friend’s cat but his own cat
hasn’t been seen for days: it has hidden himself somewhere in the
attic.” When his cousin comes to visit, he thought he had “the
home advantage,” but as usual, in this haibun, he was wrong, and
he said to himself: “The week seemed long. I should have hidden
myself in the attic.” The last section ends with a humorous senryu,
characteristic of the ongoing tone through the haibun: mountain
village / an old woman / in a 4x4. You will be amused by the colorful
characters in this book. 

BRIEFLY REVIEWED BY SHELLEY BAKER-GARD

Echoes: A Collection of Linked-Verse Poetry by Michelle Hyatt and

Jacob Salzer (Privately-printed: 2020). 100 pages, 6" x 9". Perfect softbound.
ISBN 978-1-716-41079-6. $15 from Lulu.com.

Echoes is a fine poet collaboration on various forms of renku-

inspired verse focusing on friendship. Michelle Hyatt and Jacob
Salzer are both experienced poets, and their poetry for this book
was composed during the world’s social isolation due to Covid-19.
The collection is diverse and divided into the following sections:
“Tan Renga,” “Yotsumono,” “Rengay,” “Experimental Renku,”
“Junicho,” “Kasen,” and “Solo Linked-Verse.” Besides friendship, the
other prevailing subject is a consideration for ancestors, including
mother earth or Gaia. This theme appears in many of their renku-
inspired forms. Take the following tan-renga from a sequence of
them called “Past Lives” as an example: past lives / the ancestors smile
/ in my grandma’s face // dry riverbed / the thirst for knowledge. The next
section is a group of yotsumono renku, and Hyatt and Salzer used
the book Renku Reckoner (2015) by John Edmund Carley as a guide
144 Frogpond 44:2

when choosing which form variation of renku to use. Carley came

up with the anti-thematic yotsumono form for poets interested in
creating shorter-linked verse based on the renku link, shift, and
turn composition. However, kigo or seasonal references, and fixed
topics are optional. It is a four-verse sequence for which Carley
uses the renku terms of hokku, waiku, daisan, and ageku to name
each verse. Hyatt and Salzer have four yotsumono poems in the
collection, and all of them are beautiful examples of this form.
Their junicho (12 stanzas) and kasen (36 stanzas) renku follow
the traditional subject recommendations that Carley describes
and charts out in his book. The reader will find many moon and
season verses in addition to verses about grandparents that are
wonderfully rendered in just the right order. Interestingly, Salzer
and Hyatt decided not to include the indication of the verse author
on the poem’s page itself, as is typical in published linked verse
forms. This was intended to eliminate distraction for the reader,
but if you are someone who wants to understand the personality
of the individual poets through their poetry and linking, you will
end up referencing the back of the book before you read a poem
to see who is writing the verses. Most readers will not have any
serious issues with the organization of these renku-inspired poems
and will simply enjoy the experiences and emotions they evoke. 

BRIEFLY REVIEWED BY TOM SACRAMONA

Flowers, How They Carry Us haiku by Jill Lange (café Nietzsche

press/bottle rockets press, Windsor, CT: 2020). 87 pages, 5" x 6.5". Glossy
color cover, perfect softbound. ISBN 978-1-7327746-8-1. $16 USD (postage
free within the USA) add $7 outside the USA. Mail to: Jill Lange, 2045
Staunton Rd., Cleveland Heights, OH 44118. To purchase via internet:
www.macsbacks.com/flowers-how-they-carry-us. To pay by check (USD),
contact the author at bluetwoods@gmail.com.

Jill Lange’s debut collection is fittingly named for its flower theme
 Book Reviews 145

with poppies featured across its front cover and daisies on the
back. Much like a bouquet, these poems are better for the way
they are grouped together and how their sequencing colors them,
adding vitality and interest. A purple flower example: early May
morning / before starting my car / the scent of lilacs. Red: poinsettias /
how they warm / a winter night. White: fields of daisies so many nots.
Lange’s use of motif draws earlier poems into conversation with
later ones, like in the following two where cornflowers stand in
for the speaker’s husband or memories of him: (1) cornflowers and
daises / the promises / we couldn’t keep and (2) country road / I’ve been
here before— / cornflower blues. Her effort to write about flowers at
all times of the year pays off with a book of haiku in which nearly
all resonate and many have depth. One of several sub-themes that
sustain the book’s development to its end are social justice issues,
such as in a haiku sequence called “Making Sense of It,” which
references poppies, soldiers, millennials, and war, as well as this
tanka: San Francisco / the 1984 convention / Geraldine Ferraro day—
/ everyone with flowers / mine violets. “From the beginning of the
twentieth century in France, a small bouquet of violets was a code
for love from one woman to another,” according to Jean-Michel
Othoniel’s The Secret Language of Flowers, which in the context of
Lange’s tanka, would be the love and admiration the speaker has for
Geraldine Ferraro, the first woman to be named a vice-presidential
candidate for a major party. In a section that focuses on memories,
this tanka connects well with events of present day where Kamala
Harris recently made history as the first female, first Black, and
first Asian-American vice president of the United States. This is
a good poem to end with and perhaps one that precipitated the
author’s desire to write this enjoyable floral collection: rescued— /
how a flower / also rescues us.

The Rothrock Haiku Contest by Kurt Westley (Red Moon Press,

Winchester, VA: 2020). 56 pages, 4.25" by 6.5". Glossy four-color covers,
perfect softbound. ISBN 978-1-9427271-68-5. $15 from redmoonpress.com.
146 Frogpond 44:2

Kurt Westley credits Harold G. Henderson’s An Introduction to

Haiku as “the first book flashpoint for my love for the form.” I can
say the same of The Rothrock Haiku Contest and the form Westley
creates with it, which is a genre of its own making. He uses English
epic poetry conventions to interestingly frame his short haiku-
writing competition. Akin to how William Blake’s The Marriage
of Heaven and Hell opens with an argument by Rintrah, The
Rothrock Haiku Contest opens with a prelude narrated by a being,
Rothrock, also the name of a state forest and the setting for the
contest. In the prelude, Rothrock articulates the central theme of
the work: “two soaring above windswept waters / now only one
exhales its trackless wake / trail narrows primordial boulders too
steep / to climb.” Re-reading the collection, you can understand
the basic plot: A challenge or contest between two haiku poets,
Waku and Woro, where only one wins and exits the forest; the
other remains stuck, “gasping for words that will not come.” The
back of the book features a pencil drawing of a shanty, presumably
where the losing poet must live out his days, until perhaps they
have another fated haiku contest? The haiku competition occurs
in several rounds that take place in autumn (9), followed by winter
(7) and spring (2), and (2) non-season rounds called “the hut’s
isolation” and “conclusion.” They repeat the subject of “mountains”
for both autumn and winter, and I think there could have been
more variation of subjects in a collection this short: downdraft
raven / autumn mountain / bulges in his missing eye (Waku) and winter
mountain / ascending into the very clouds! / or is it coming closer? (Woru).
These writers yearn to transcend their earthly bodies or escape
the forest, and to such a degree, the judge once comments, as is
typical each round, “Are both haiku hermits wary of their own
corporeal bones tonight?” Other times, the judge’s commentary
lauds the winning haiku for their “immediacy of image,” “unique
pictorial twist,” or “mystery.” This is a book with an intriguing
frame narrative that I enjoyed learning about and exploring how
Westley put it to good use.
 Book Reviews 147

Grateful Haiku: Capturing the Grateful Dead Experience in

One-Breath Poems by Mark Dailey (Free Food Press, Rochester NY:
2021). 32 pages, 5.5" x 8.5". Spray-painted card covers, no two alike, string
bound. No ISBN. $8 USA, $25 all other countries from freefoodpress.org.

This chapbook features over 75 haiku and senryu that joyfully

span the career of a celebrated band by a talented poet. Yes, this
collection by Mark Dailey really is spray-painted and no two
copies are alike, just like no two live recordings of a Dead song
sound the same: drifting incense / a different Dead song / from every
car. This is certainly a delightful read for fellow Dead fans. You
can also approach Dailey’s book like a live poetry reading, hearing
him read some haiku that receive the greatest reactions from the
audience, such as expanding cosmos / somehow we find / our seats.
In this collection that isn’t trying to be serious, poems so often
succeed for that very reason—they aren’t trying to be anything
other than they are—fun—which was Jerry Garcia’s credo anyway.
I care about so many of these based on my love for the band:
spreading like wildfire / the news that Jerry / wore red and how softly /
how beautifully / Jerry forgets the words. If, in the last example, you
thought of Jerry’s long-term drug-addiction, weight problems, and
diabetes all contributing to his physical decline and early death,
and the poem’s soft moment of Jerry’s spirit coming through in the
way he says the words, not mattering if they are indeed the right
words, then you should get this book ASAP because it was written
for you. A number of Dailey’s poems can be enjoyed regardless of
if you are a Deadhead, as in this poem which previously appeared
in Frogpond and still stands as a gem even without this collection
providing its association with a Dead song: morning dew / finding
the champagne cork / in the grass. I delighted in seeing that poem’s
inclusion in the context of this chapbook. I’ll end with this poem
about entering a concert venue since you’ll be getting a front-row
seat when you begin this collection: gate security / squeezes us together
/ the first moo.
148 Frogpond 44:2

Torn Asunder: Putting Back the Pieces memoir by David H. Rosen

(Resource Publications, Eugene, OR, 2021). 87 pages, 5" x 6.5". Glossy
color cover, perfect bound. ISBN 978-1-7327746-8-1. Available from online
booksellers.

This is part two of David Rosen’s memoir. It covers both

Rosen’s work life and personal life, unpacking his identities as
a psychiatrist, researcher, husband, father, Jungian analyst, and
poet. In the preface, Rosen explains that writing this book was
a way to heal and “put back the pieces” since his 2009 diagnosis
with multiple sclerosis. His first memoir from 2014, Lost in the Long
White Cloud: Finding My Home, covered his birth to age 30. As fate
would have it, I received Torn Asunder in the mail a few days after
finishing Gary Lachman’s Jung the Mystic: The Esoteric Dimensions of
Carl Jung’s Life and Teachings (2010). Jung and Rosen would surely
see this as an example of synchronicity—those eerie occurrences in
life that have no causal relationship yet seem to be related. In this
memoir, Rosen records many of these instances, so if you have any
interest in Jung, you would certainly enjoy learning more about
how Rosen perceives the world. Rosen’s memoir is replete with
photos of his family and places he’s been to over the years, along
with details of his chronic depression and impressive publishing
ventures. On the whole, the blurb on the back of the book by Mark
Unno, professor of religious studies at the University of Oregon
and a Shin Buddhist priest, sums up this book best: “David Rosen
in this memoir is in turns vulnerable, courageous, sad, joyful,
too human, funny, and extraordinarily generous and wise.” Of
about 50 short poems that are interspersed throughout, this is my
personal favorite: Village of thatched roofs / On a lush mountain / The
monk’s meal of greens.

Wild Violets haiku by Paul Cordeiro. (Privately-printed: 2021). 20 pages,

5.5" x 8.5". Saddle stitched.

Paul Cordeiro’s chapbook Wild Violets was laid out by season by the
 Book Reviews 149

poet’s close friend, Bob Barboza, who is also a haiku writer. Wild
Violets and Cordeiro’s collection from 2013, Bare Earth, are available
for free from The Haiku Foundation’s Digital Library. Comparing
them, pets remain a muse: labor day dusk / the beagle buries / a stewed
bone. In the newer work, there’s a single monoku: rolling out recycling
bins thunderclouds. Cordeiro also ventures into bolder territory in
the new work, including erotic tanka: rubbing legs / beneath the blue
moon / these crickets / not the only ones / in harmony.

Travel by Haiku compiled by Marshall Deerfield (A Freedom Book,

Philadelphia, PA: 2021). 149 pages, 5" x 6". ISBN 978-0998425832.
Available from afreedombooks.com.

Six collaborators co-authored their own Jack Kerouac-style “haikus”

on a road trip. Each writer contributes a single line and together each
line forms the haiku-like poem: Beside / the white line / the tie-dye /
scavenger / poet / harvests dream / catchers. 

Errata
In the previous issue 44:1—

• Reference to Allyson Whipple’s haiku on page 23 was

accidently omitted from the author index.

• On page 112, Hokusai’s jisei “matsu no hara” should be “natsu

nohara.”
150 Frogpond 44:2

Author Index

Agarwal, Raghavi 65 Bierovic, Tom 7

Lucknow, India DeLand, FL
Aoyagi, Fay 17, 45 Bisshie 8
San Francisco, CA Zürich, Switzerland
Ashbaugh, Marilyn 4 Blöttenberger, Meik 28
Gulf Stream, FL Hanover, PA
Ashraf, Hifsa 49 Blumner, Jacob 24
Rawalpindi, Pakistan Flint, Michigan
Ayeyemi, Taofeek 36, 73 Bobbiesi, Elisa 8
Port Harcourt, Rivers State, Nigeria Williamsburg, VA
Baeyens, Michael 32 Bogar, Adam T. 11
Geraardsbergen, Belgium Folkestone, England
Balistreri, Jo 19 Brickley, Chuck 46, 85
Waukesha, WI Daly City, CA
Banwarth, Francine 45 Bridges, Alan S. 34
Dubuque, IA Westford, MA
Barlow, John 52 Burch, Susan 37
Ormskirk, England Hagerstown, MD
Barry, Aaron 10 Burgevin, Anne 6
Port Moody, BC, Canada Pennsylvania Furnace, PA
Bartow, Stuart 72 Burt, Dan 26
Salem, NY Alabama
Bateman, Sam 13 Byrnes, Sondra 27
Everett, WA Santa Fe, NM
Beary, Roberta 19 Caretti, Matthew 21, 71
Westport, Co Mayo, Ireland Budapest
Bell, Amanda 15 Cashman, David 7
Dublin, Ireland Providence, RI
Bennett, Brad 78, 89 Castaldi, Erin 9
Arlington, MA Mays Landing, NJ
Berger, Maxianne 41 Cechota, Cynthia 40
Outremont, QC, Canada Dubuque, IA
Bhattacharrya, Amiya 117 Chambers, Paul 42
Decatur, GA Wales
 Author Index 151

Chellappan, Hemapriya 31 Eklund-Cheong, Anna 15

Pune, Maharashtra, India Croissy-sur-Seine, France
Cheung, Antoinette 41 Epstein, Robert 53
Vancouver, BC, Canada El Cerrito, CA
Clausen, Tom 35 Eyre, David Kāwika 45
Ithaca, NY Volcano, HI
Clement, Joyce 55 Fanto, Elizabeth 70
Bristol, CT Timonium, MD
Coats, Glenn G. 7, 69 Fargo, Seren 50
Carolina Shores, NC Bellingham, WA
Compton, Ellen 14 Farrelly, Colleen 77
Washington, DC Miami, FL
Cooper, Bill 54 Fay, Ignatius 54
Naples, FL Sudbury, ON, Canada
Cremin, Tim 76 Feingold, Bruce H. 21
Andover, MA Berkeley, CA
Curtis, Dan 14 Ferrara, Jeffrey 47
Victoria, BC, Canada Worcester, MA
Dailey, Mark 19 Fontaine-Pincince, Denise 22
Prescott, AZ Belchertown, MA
Das, Anisha 64 Ford, Lorin 5
Kolkata, India Brunswick, Victoria, Australia
Davis, Pat 33 Forges-Ryan, Sylvia 60–63
Pembroke, NH North Haven, CT
Decker, Warren 36 French, Terri L. 44, 78, 88
Izumi, Japan Sioux Falls, SD
Defibaugh, M. R. 51 Friedenberg, Jay 23
Chesterfield, VA New York, NY
Dey, Tanisha 64 Furst, Susan Beth 3
Kolkata, West Bengal, India Fishersville, VA
Doppler, Janice 35 Fyffe, Alex 25
Easthampton, MA Stafford, TX
Duguay, Martin 6 Gaa, Ben 44
Gyeongsan, South Korea St. Louis, MO
Dunphy, John 11 Gage, Joshua 17
Alton, IL Cleveland, OH
152 Frogpond 44:2

Gallagher, Mike 24 He, David 20

Lyreacrompane, Ireland Zhuanglang, China
Georgacopoulos, Angelina 119 Hemnani, Khushi 65
Tewksbury, MA Mumbai, Maharashtra, India
George, Barry 30 Hendricks, Paul 40
Philadelphia, PA Missoula, MT
Giesecke, Lee 10 Higgins, Frank 9
Annandale, VA Kansas City, MO
Gilli, Ferris 41 Hoagland, Jeff 51
Marietta, GA Hopewell, NJ
Gilliland, Robert 49 Holzer, Ruth 24
Austin, TX Herndon, VA
Gorman, LeRoy 35, 80 Hotham, Gary 4
Napanee, ON, Canada Scaggsville, MD
Grayson, David 29 Huddleston, Edward Cody 32
Alameda, CA Baxley, GA
Greer, Laurie 13 Jacobson, Roberta Beach 20
Washington, DC Indianola, IA
GRIX 5 Jastermsky, Peter 27
Middletown, DE Morongo Valley, CA
Grover, Dana 25 Kadric, Elmedin 36
San Jose, CA Helsingborg, Sweden
Gurga, Lee 39, 51 Kaur, Arvinder 23
Piatt County, IL Chandigarh, India
Hall, Carolyn 10, 13 Kelsey, Julie Bloss 15
San Francisco, CA Germantown, MD
Hambrick, Jennifer 53, 89 Ketchek, Michael 24
Columbus, OH Rochester, NY
Hare, Jon 39 Khan, Mohammad Azim 5
Falmouth, MA Peshawar, Pakistan
Hart, William 53 kjmunro 37
Montrose, CA Whitehorse, Canada
Harvey, Michele L. 16, 83 Koen, Deb 30
Hamilton, NY Rochester, NY
Haynes, Tia 33 Kulkarni, Gauri 64
Lakewood, OH Pune, Maharashtra, India
 Author Index 153

Latham, Jessica Malone 18 Mathisen, Nicholas 14

Valley Ford, CA Portland, OR
Laurila, Jim 12 Matta, Richard L. 13
Florence, MA San Diego, CA
Lee, Michael Henry 43 McDonald, Tanya 32
Saint Augustine, FL Woodinville, WA
Lehmann, Kat 44, 86 McIntosh, Tyler 52
Guilford, CT Boulder, CO
Levine, Barrie 31 McKeon, Joe 30
Wenham, MA Strongsville, OH
Levy, Jerry 9 McManus, John 53
Deerfield, IL Carlisle, England
Lilly, Rebecca 22 Mellor, Julie 26
Port Republic, VA Sheffield, England
Lindquist, Kristen 27, 66, 89 Miko, Vicki 79
Camden, ME Costa Mesa, CA
Liu, Chen-ou 46 Miller, Jayne 31
Ajax, ON, Canada Hazel Green, WI
Longenecker, Gregory 36 Miller, Mark 26
Pasadena, CA Shoalhaven Heads, Australia
Longman, Madelaine Caritas 11 Minor, Lori A 20
Montreal, QC, Canada Warren, OH
Lott, Kendall 76 Momoi, Beverly Acuff 29
Bloomington, IN Mountain View, CA
Lucky, Bob 18 Montreuil, Mike 28
Viana do Castelo, Portugal Ottawa, ON, Canada
Machmiller, Patricia J. 8 Moore, Lenard D. 10
San Jose, CA Mt. Olive, NC
Mahoney, Hannah 3 Moore, Barbara 14
Cambridge, MA San Jose, CA
Makino, Annette 40 Morrissey, Laurie D. 46
Arcata, CA Hopkinton, NH
Martin, Jeannie 55 Moyer, Robert 43
Arlington, MA Winston Salem, NC
Mason, Scott 11 Muirhead, Marsh 32
Chappaqua, NY Bemidji, MN
154 Frogpond 44:2

Murphy, Tim 38 Partridge, Brent 48

Madrid, Spain Orinda, CA
Murray, Paul 54 Patchel, Christopher 4
Canberra, Australia Libertyville, IL
Muth, Jamie A. 29 Pearce, Jacquie 25
Boston, MA Vancouver, Canada
Newton, Peter 55 Perera, Oshadha 118
Rutland, VT Invercargill, New Zealand
Nicely, Elliot 9 Pierides, Stella 30, 73
Lakewood, OH Neusaess, DE / London, England
Nika 18 Piko, Gregory 26
Calgary, AB, Canada Canberra, Australia
O’Connor, Kieran 43 Pillai, Lakshmi 65
Sydney, Australia Kochi, Kerala, India
Oblak, Polona 12 Piotrowski, Robert 44
Ljubljana, Slovenia Mississauga, Canada
O’Connor, John S. 34 Polette, Keith 50, 79
Chicago, IL El Paso, TX
Ogden, Helen 20 Pray, Sandi 33
Pacific Grove, CA St. Johns, FL
Ortiz, Victor 18 Quinn, Matt 28
Bellingham, WA Brighton, England
Owen, Renée 50, 67 Ramesh, Kala 84
Sebastopol, CA Pune, India
Packer, Roland 21 Redmond, Bob 49
Hamilton, Canada Burien, WA
Padden, Lorraine A. 45 Renda, Samantha 28
San Diego, CA Cape Town, South Africa
Painting, Tom 21, 74 Rhutasel-Jones, Sharon 42, 67
Atlanta, GA Los Ranchos, NM
Parashar, Vandana 29 Rickert, Bryan 38, 86, 88
Panchkula, India Belleville, IL
Pardo, Aida 116 Rielly, Edward J. 52
Atlanta, GA Westbrook, ME
Parthare, Vishwajit 64 Robello, Joseph 15
Pune, Maharashtra, India Mill Valley, CA
 Author Index 155

Root-Bernstein, Michele 1, 7, 47, 80 Sharma, Manoj 43

East Lansing, MI Kathmandu, Nepal
Ross, Bruce 16 Shepherd, Katrina 17
Hampden, ME Scotland, UK
Roycraft, Maggie 39 Silk 39
Morristown, NJ New York
S, Srinivas 6 Skane, George 37
Rishi Valley, India Georgetown, MA
Salzer, Jacob 50 Sprecksel, Derek 8
Vancouver, WA Manteca, CA
Sarode, Sayali 65 Sterba, Carmen 72
Pune, Maharashtra, India University Place, WA
Sato, Hiroaki 60–63 Stevens, Mary 4
New York, NY Hurley, NY
Savich, Agnes Eva 31 Stevenson, John 34
Austin, TX Nassau, NY
Schick, Linda McCarthy 37 Strange, Debbie 27
Brooklyn, NY Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada
Schlett, James 12 Sunjaya, Agus Maulana 47
Colonie, NY Tangerang, Banten, Indonesia
Schopfer, Olivier 25 Swede, George 22, 77
Geneva, Switzerland Toronto, ON, Canada
Short, Gabby 117 Swist, Wally 3
Atlanta, GA Amherst, MA
Schwartz, Greg 40 Tabor, Makarios 16
Sykesville, MD Greenville, SC
Schwerin, Julie 42, 46, 81, 82, 87 Tarquinio, Rick 12
Greendale, WI Woodruff, NJ
Schwerin, Dan 3, 5, 87 Terry, Angela 34, 82
Greendale, WI Sequim, WA
Sehgal, Mehr 64 Thompson, John 85
Jalandhar, Punjab, India Sonoma, CA
Sethi, Ustat 118 Thorp, Carly Siegel 22
Bangalore, India Sterling, MA
Shah, Zeal 65 Tico, Nathanael 17
Surat, Gujarat, India San Francisco, CA
156 Frogpond 44:2

tripi, vincent 56–57 Witmer, Robert 48

Trumbull, Charles 90–108 Tokyo, Japan
Santa Fe, NM Wynand, Genevieve 54
Ungar, Barbara 6 Coquitlam, BC, Canada
Saratoga Springs, NY Yarrow, Ruth 35
Valentine, Kevin 47 Ithaca, NY
Mesquite, TX Young, Gideon 38
Van, Mona 23 Chapel Hill, NC
Orange, CA Young, Virginia Brady 60–63
Vig, Khwahish 64–65 Zajkowski, Lori 33
Mumbai, Maharashtra, India New York, NY
Vishnoi, Pragya 48
Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh, India
Waliyullah, Adesokan Babatunde 16
Oyo State, Nigeria
Watts, David 23
Mill Valley, CA
Watts, Lew 48, 75
Chicago, IL
Webb, Diana 68
Leatherhead, Surrey, UK
Weidensaul, Mary 41
Granby, MA
Welch, Michael Dylan 55, 58–59, 81
Sammamish, WA 109–115
White, Mary 19
Dublin, Ireland
White, Mike 52
Salt Lake City, UT
Wiggerman, Scott 49
Albuquerque, NM
Williams, Tony 38
Scotland, UK
Williams, Rhys Owain 42
Swansea, Wales
 HSA Membership and Frogpond Submissions 157

HSA Membership and Frogpond Submissions

The Haiku Society of America (HSA) is a not-for-profit organization
founded in 1968 to promote the writing and appreciation of haiku in
English. The Society’s journal, Frogpond, founded in 1978, features work
by the HSA members and others, as well as essays, articles, and book
reviews. The HSA has approximately 900 members across the country
and around the world. Membership is open to all readers, writers,
and students of haiku. The HSA maintains a website with additional
information about the Society, archives of winners of the HSA contests,
and other haiku activities at https://www.hsa-haiku.org/. The HSA has
been meeting regularly since its inception and sponsors open lectures,
workshops, readings, and contests. Details of locations, times, and
programs will appear in the HSA e-newsletter and website, as will
announcements and details of regional, national, and international
meetings and events. Reminders of national meetings, HSA contest
deadlines, and occasional other news or announcements will also be sent
by e-mail. Inquiries regarding regional meetings can also be addressed to
the appropriate regional coordinator.

HSA Membership: For adults in the USA, $35; in Canada/Mexico, $37;

for seniors (65 or over) and students in the USA, $30; all other countries,
$47, or international PDF-only membership, $35. Pay by check on a USA
bank or by International Postal Money Order, payable to Haiku Society
of America, Inc. All memberships are annual, expiring on December 31,
and include three issues of Frogpond as well as newsletters, the members’
anthology, and voting rights. You can also subscribe online by PayPal
or credit card at https://www.hsa-haiku.org/join.htm. All correspondence
regarding new and renewed memberships, changes of address, back issues,
and requests for information should be directed to the HSA secretary.

Frogpond Submissions: There are three issues of Frogpond each year with
month-long submission periods per issue—all of March for the spring/
summer issue, all of July for the autumn issue, and all of November
for the winter issue. Please see our full submission guidelines online at
https://www.hsa-haiku.org/frogpond/submissions.html. E-mail submissions
are preferred and can be sent to frogpondsubmissions@gmail.com.
158 Frogpond 44:2

HSA Officers

President Jay Friedenberg jay.friedenberg@gmail.com

1st Vice President Gary Hotham hsavicepres@aol.com
2nd Vice President Chuck Brickley hsa.2vp.chuck@gmail.com
Secretary Dianne Garcia garciadianne@hotmail.com
Treasurer Bill Deegan hsa.treasurer@yahoo.com
Frogpond Editor Tom Sacramona frogpondsubmissions@gmail.com
HSA Newsletter Editor Ignatius Fay hsabulletin@gmail.com
E-Media Officer Randy Brooks brooksbooks@gmail.com

Regional Coordinators

Pacific NW Brett Brady brettbrady@gmail.com

California Deborah P Kolodji dkolodji@aol.com
Oregon Shelley Baker-Gard sbakergard@msn.com
Washington Seren Fargo serenfargohsa@gmail.com
Mountains Jackie Robinson imjlr98@aol.com
Southwest Barbara Hays barbellen58@rocketmail.com
Southeast Michael Henry Lee michaelhenrylee@bellsouth.net
South Margaret Dornaus singingmoonpoetry@gmail.com
Midwest Bryan Rickert bcrickert72@yahoo.com
Northeast Wanda Cook willowbranch32@yahoo.com
N.E. Metro Rita Gray ritagray58@gmail.com
Mid-Atlantic Robert Ertman robertertman@msn.com
Journal of the Haiku Society of America