Still waiting...

The son is home now
His gear spread out on the floor
All of him we've seen

Walking home

Now you are so wet

The rain no longer matters

Winter in your skin

Early, late in December

Moon hangs in the sky
half a pearl this cold morning
close to the New Year

The language of light

(Not to be confused with Thomas Kinkade, painter of light)


I love light—its colors and textures. I love the paintings of the impressionists and the photographs of Edward Weston, Dorothea Lange, and Walker Evans.

I love to write about light, to try to paint it in words.

Now, I have a camera, and so I'm trying to learn a new language. Technology: many settings to read and remember (and I'm more of a point-and-click kind of gal).

Friday, on my walk home from the bus, I took several pictures. It was too dark. They were all dark.

Yesterday afternoon, I was able to get a few images of the tree at the end of our alley.

Spokes of many wheels
Branches travel to the sky
Anchored in winter

Forecast

Watching for the snow
A day looking through windows
Always wanting more

Solstice

Light one more candle
This longest night of the year
Darkness will not stay

Late in the season

Planting crocus bulbs
Visions of gold and violet
Waiting for the spring

Still no sign of snow

I wanted a little line of poetry, and I wanted it to be about snow. I looked high. I looked low. I looked at the Poetry Foundation website and at bartleby.com, and then I realized that I could use one of my Decemer haikus. I could even write just the one that would say what I wanted to say.

Isn't that the point?

After a little work, I came up with:

Waiting for the snow
To change December landscapes
The world looking new

Then today, I sent it to Michael Dylan Welch, who knows much more about haiku than I do or ever will. He had a suggestion, so my latest version is:

Waiting for the snow
To change rain-blackened branches
The world looking new

Is it better? I don't know. Does it say what I need it to say? I'm not sure. I think the first version says what I want it to say. But Michael's comment opens up the possibility for change, and I can keep exploring it.

Three lines, Seventeen syllables or so. And still a wealth of possibility.

Now, time to check the weather forecast.

Well, it has a season word...

Knees ache with winter.
Cat sleeps on my lap. I watch.
That's all I can do.

Waiting

No snow. Little wind.
Winter hovers on the stoop
Gives nothing away.

Money plants

Thin thickets of coins
pale as the December sky
next year's seeds ready

Written in a fit of insomnia

Duck tucks its head back
Nestles beak under warm wing
To sleep on water

More about haiku

Most of us learned, probably in school, that a haiku is a Japanese poetry form in three lines 5, 7, and 5 syllables. This, it turns out, is a simplification and not necessarily true. It's a good firm guideline, a rule you can hang your hat on, but it overpowers the inherent subtleties of the form.

Recently, Peter Pereira pointed to a post about Haiku Blogging and offered that as a way to create short, compressed blog posts. Michael Dylan Welch then weighed in (yes, I'm kind of giving you the play-by-play) with some comments.

Michael knows a lot about haiku, and in his comments he explains that other factors are usually considered more important than a syllabic structure (Japanese doesn't parse by syllables anyway, but by sounds, or mora). These factors, he continues, are "kigo (season word), kireji (cutting word that usually divides the poem into two juxtaposed parts), and objective imagery (no concepts, judgments, conclusions, or analysis)." He adds that you can find a different haiku every day at tinywords.com.

For more information about haiku, you can read Becoming a haiku poet or Michael's ten tips, or you can visit his collection of haiku and photographs, Open Window.

No sign of snow

The clear sky a bowl
Robin's egg blue in winter
A day to begin

Today's

Winter comes to rest
The darkest nights of the year
A few clouds, few stars

Yesterday's haiku

Dark as an old hat
Morning hides inside of it
Winter sleeps late

***

Bottle of roses
Bright red beneath a gray sky
Man on his way home

***

These holiday lights
Like moons floating in pastels
Unexpected Spring