:
blood-orange sunsets
the last of summer brilliance
long after spring
blossoms fluttered the wind
fall flowers radiate light
:
©️2018 Ontheland
In response to Carpe Diem’s Tanka Splendor: Basho’s Blossoms, celebrating Carpe Diem’s 6th anniversary.
Tag: aging
on the highway
Yesterday I was driving on the 401 to and from Toronto—it was no picnic, in sweltering heat and hours of bumper to bumper traffic crawling next to lines of towering trucks. There were pleasant moments—beyond nibbling buns from a Chinese bakery. Squirrels were everywhere at the downtown park…one boldly snacked in the middle of the roadway…too tame for its own good.
On the highway I contemplated leafy canopies of deciduous trees.
September treetops
leaves slowly changing colour
like my hair
~
©️2018 Ontheland
“show me the way to the Ocean!”
who is it?
who thirsts for all this
these transient things
that bind the spirit?
Take me to the sky
wrap me in music,
the gentle silence of dawn
false spring?
it’s the fire of life
the roar of the sea
©️2018 Ontheland
~
Today I respond to Carpe Diem #1391: A Great Silence featuring an ode of Jalaluddin Rumi…perhaps one could call my piece an experimental haibun. Rumi’s poem has so much to savour:
I don’t get tired of You. Don’t grow weary
of being compassionate toward me!
All this thirst-equipment
must surely be tired of me,
the waterjar, the water-carrier.
I have a thirsty fish in me
that can never find enough
of what it’s thirsty for!
Show me the way to the Ocean!
Break these half-measures,
these small containers.
All this fantasy
and grief.
Let my house be drowned in the wave
that rose last night out of the courtyard
hidden in the center of my chest.
Joseph fell like the moon into my well.
The harvest I expected was washed away.
But no matter.
A fire has risen above my tombstone hat.
I don’t want learning, or dignity,
or respectability.
I want this music and this dawn
and the warmth of your cheek against mine.
The grief-armies assemble,
but I’m not going with them.
This is how it always is
when I finish a poem.
A Great Silence overcomes me,
and I wonder why I ever thought
to use language.
© Rumi, Coleman Barks translation
~
for Haibun Monday
My hair silvers at the temples and falls out in long white strands. It was brown, then dark dark brown and now…I wonder if my hair is thinning…..my mother’s hair was always blonde….different shades of blonde…she made sure of that. And now my plumage changes. What will leave and what will stay?
old robin flies
in late winter grey
white down catches light
©2018 Ontheland
~
In this haibun I blend a story about hair with my recent sightings of robins. Reading about these birds I discovered that some robins live five years or more if they survive their first year. I am fairly certain that the robins in my yard stayed here for the winter, perhaps feasting on the abundant juniper berries. Their signature red breasts and white plumage on throats and under tails brighten up the landscape.
Only the first line
Today I tackled Carpe Diem’s “Only the first line” challenge creating the following four haiku from four given first lines. In Ontario, Canada, where I live, there is no sign of spring yet—as is normal in January. The first line prompts hint at warmer days, but I stayed within my local experience:
hot summer day
pine scents bear sweet memories
in mid-winter thaw
~
a walk through the city
in winter obstacle course
towering snowbanks
~
the passing spring
these cautious steps were once bold
muscle strength fading
~
steel blue night
only in photo albums
this winter
~
©️2018 Ontheland
Ontheland 