Bits and pieces
I sharpened up the Salvation Army "foot poem" and it has been accepted
here. Look under Open Mouse. There's a really lovely poem just been posted there about an urban fox and child.
Colin has also told me our renga is going to appear in Haiku Scotland, which is great news.
I feel like my writing is making a tiny bit of progress, although I know I will never really be a true, deep-veined, in the bones type of poet. But it does help me feel more rounded as a person, like shortbread ;), and that is helpful.
In our writers' forum Colin Will gave us some information on haiban and invited us to try writing one. (It is a highly focused piece of prose of 200-300 words, which uses poetic language to describe a journey, place or perhaps an encounter, and it ends with a haiku that encapsulates and adds to the piece.)
This is my first attempt at one. It's based on my longest day last week when I took a friend to a favourite place of mine.
A New Path
Two women on a snaking, muddy track - boots wet and caked with the red clay.
All around them the wood rings with the song of unseen birds. Soft rain and mist hugs the treetops, as though the sky has decided to gently compress the land.
Candelabras of purple fade in the under storey, giving way to spires of foxgloves
- including random white ones, which glow in the low, grey light.
A deer runs for cover. A hawk glides silently upwards.
The women arrive at the clearing to find it carpeted with eyebright, and all ashimmer with the dew-soaked flowers of a most delicate of grass.
Five perfect rowans, clad in summer green, stand at the centre.
All the paths of the wood emerge and converge here, like sockets on the rim of some colossal wheel.
The two stop and listen to a silence that feels ancient and holy.
The woman who has never been here before marvels at the peace and remembers her earlier panic when, after collecting her mother's ashes, she found herself lost in the city of her birth - heart and all sense of direction engulfed by fog and grief.
mist shrouds
the longest day
of the year
here. Look under Open Mouse. There's a really lovely poem just been posted there about an urban fox and child.
Colin has also told me our renga is going to appear in Haiku Scotland, which is great news.
I feel like my writing is making a tiny bit of progress, although I know I will never really be a true, deep-veined, in the bones type of poet. But it does help me feel more rounded as a person, like shortbread ;), and that is helpful.
In our writers' forum Colin Will gave us some information on haiban and invited us to try writing one. (It is a highly focused piece of prose of 200-300 words, which uses poetic language to describe a journey, place or perhaps an encounter, and it ends with a haiku that encapsulates and adds to the piece.)
This is my first attempt at one. It's based on my longest day last week when I took a friend to a favourite place of mine.
A New Path
Two women on a snaking, muddy track - boots wet and caked with the red clay.
All around them the wood rings with the song of unseen birds. Soft rain and mist hugs the treetops, as though the sky has decided to gently compress the land.
Candelabras of purple fade in the under storey, giving way to spires of foxgloves
- including random white ones, which glow in the low, grey light.
A deer runs for cover. A hawk glides silently upwards.
The women arrive at the clearing to find it carpeted with eyebright, and all ashimmer with the dew-soaked flowers of a most delicate of grass.
Five perfect rowans, clad in summer green, stand at the centre.
All the paths of the wood emerge and converge here, like sockets on the rim of some colossal wheel.
The two stop and listen to a silence that feels ancient and holy.
The woman who has never been here before marvels at the peace and remembers her earlier panic when, after collecting her mother's ashes, she found herself lost in the city of her birth - heart and all sense of direction engulfed by fog and grief.
mist shrouds
the longest day
of the year
posted by apprentice at
9:48 am
10 Comments:
Oh fantastic. I really like this idea. I had a go at a Renga with my class. We didn't exactly follow any rules as such other than the syllable formation. They are performing it on Friday, hopefully it will bring some tears to people's eyes. Meanwhile I will have a go at the haiban idea myself ... next week!
Glad you liked it . I can get you a renga scheme from Colin if you like?
this is a great example of haiban:
http://www.worldhaikureview.org/5-1/whchb/haibun_Ruggieri.htm
Very immodestly, there's one of my own haibun in the same issue of World Haiku Review:
http://www.worldhaikureview.org/5-1/whchb/haibun_Will.htm
Oh I missed that! How did I not see it? I need to start wearing my specs I think.
I like the geological references, it makes the sense of place feel very precise Colin.
I just think you get better and better.
Aw thank you Pat.
Beautiful, so vivid and serene.
Well done on the accepted poem.
Congratulations - To be sure, you are a woman of many talents. I love the way you have drawn us a moment in time when nature and two humans merged to create a special moment - captured so well by yourself, and then completed wonderfully with the haiku.
Thank you Lucy and CB. It was a very strange day and Colin's exercise came out of the blue and just at the right moment to help me put it into words.
Katherine has looked after her mother for so long, through all the stages of dementia, and to suddenly stop a caring role like that is a very powerful life event.
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