the only star (haibun for Locating the Senses in Language and Place)
As if it is unusual, the way evening falls on our lives in the winter. The cold bars us in, our thoughts seemingly unto each own. Winter, I once said, drawing a long sigh, asks of us the wearying task of digging into our burrows alone and not together, like squirrels and hares and bears. As if I hardly change. As if the seasons pass me by and like a portrait on stone—my pose in reverie engraved the way I must look right now. No sound except Kat-kat sleeping, purring dreams.
I murmur. I know. Soon, the cold winds will curl up and roll into the hearts of seas. Heat will seep off iced waters and the dark earth. I know a clump of snowdrops by the gate will spawn again, shy as virgins who would never look up to their lovers’ eyes. In a while, crocuses will sprout buds like pursed lips, waiting for a kiss. Not filigreed lawns but mantled front gardens of Queen Anne’s lace will soon spark.
This morning, I glimpsed pregnant knuckles of hydrangea twigs, though the cherry trees remain dead in the cold sun. I know their blossoms, as well the white plums and magnolias, will huddle over skies in a night. But for now, deep in the quietness of snow
this longing
at moonrise
the only star
by Alegria Imperial posted for
Locating the Senses in Language and Place Edition #14, Stella Pierides, editor
doves/winter dawn/eyes (haiku on relationships at NaHaiWriMo)
Inca doves nesting courtesy of wikicommons
1.
cooing
we slip past
the brambles
3.
winter dawn
grayer than her tresses
on his chest
3.
eyes
locked in adoration
my cat and i
Nov 25th prompt by Carlos Colon at the still ongoing National Haiku Writing Month (NaHaWriMo facebook site) with slight editing of #1.
three ‘starry night’ haiku (extras from Sketchbook submission)
1.
starry night
Venus sputters last
where to this time?
2.
eyes on the sky
is it them that cause
this starry night?
3.
cleaver
must it be moon-less
a starry night?
into fog (my first tanka in print)
into fog
we lose who we are
under oaks
first a weight in the eyes
then our hands no longer ours
copyright (c) by Alegria Imperial 2011
First published in Eucalypt: a tanka journal 10 2011 Edited by Beverley George
One of five tanka from which Elizabeth Howard, past winner, had picked her best choice or a winner in the issue.
Posted for One Shot Wednesday at One Stop Poetry. A sad note comes with this post as I lose friends on this site who are leaving for other clear meadows, Adam, Brian, Chris G, Claudia and Pete. I’ve gained a steady ground from which my poetry had soared from their constant nourishment in generous words. I’ll really miss you! But come check us out for this last One Shot with the team.
baseball haiku or senryu? (from NaHaiWriMo site)
a.
all eyes up
not on the moon but the ball—
a Yankee scores*
(*I’m a Yankees fan)
b.
ninth inning—
she chews on the last bite
of her Babe Ruth
c.
flock of birds–
the Blue Jays bat the Orioles
out of Camden Yards
posted on 06/23 under the prompt ball games at the FB NaHaiWriMo site
transmutation (for One Shoot Sunday)
Photo prompt by Adam Romanowicz.
trapped in a shell
of dreams, the night careens
into an abyss–
the paradise of mollusks
unknown to stars
alien, Night
drowns in crystal tears
engorging shell hearts
layering an encrusted
stone
the sea lashes
the mollusks and turns
Night into strands
of sea spray
Night, the alien
grows eyes
globules of crystals
floating as froth
a veil to hide the birthing
mollusks
Night, the witness
in paradise becomes the sea
as heaving shells open
to let breathe the pearl
they birth
startled
in the blinding brightness
Night leaps and grows wings
springing off its eyes
jewels of sparks
an ocean breath
exhales Night back to dying stars
Night, the prodigal
now smithereens of tears
rain on cupped leaves
frozen as
bejeweled Dawn
on leaf strands
en-clasped like it were
its heart
a shell
Composed from a photo prompt by Adam Romanowicz and
posted for One Shoot Sunday at One Stop Poetry, the inimitable gathering place for poets and artists. Come immerse yourself, better yet share your work and your ideas about others’. Check us out!
The Bootmaker (for One Shoot Sunday)
photo prompt by Rob Hanson
He wraps his broadness
around the air he gathers in quiet
hands poking a wasp caught in a web.
Overhead a patch of sunlight–
he fails to see the breeze
brushing its plum seeds:
his eyes clouded over
for the flights of mourning doves
breathless as once they alit
on her gray hair whiter
than Venus rising before she flew off
leaving him a smile in a cast.
Mornings encase him in this chair
that moulds his spine arched in years
renews his fingers to love the iron last–
he fits today the dancing tips of a shoe
the red-haired woman tears each night
and comes storming in
her breath of fermented cherries
swarms on the leather swatches the jute strings
the hammer and anvil softening them as if
oiling the edges of buried embers
he bends as if cowering in fear as if
a female fox sears him with flaming eyes.
Her eyes waved on tips of ocean weeds
the first time she smiled pulling him
in an undertow of coral reefs
unresisting he yielded to her depths
softer than mollusk flesh
more supple than oyster cheeks.
She braids her red hair this morning
pulls tight her cheeks baring her teeth–
he knows from where she draws water
the well in the woods some elves abandoned
in the spring for an ocean
breeds red dragonflies that turn into wands.
In the pool under the elms
he waits at dusk long after the sun
has turned away long before the moon creeps up
as if shy for its stained cheek and curved chin.
In the wan light she rises over the reeds
afloat, a smile framed by her white hair.
Her red hair catches sparks
from skids of the hammer he blinks
she nudges him—words turn into grunts
from joints of his chair the weight
bearing down on his contracting heart—
“Come tonight I’ll dance for you.”
Her white hair catches foam
from far off billows, she swirls around him—
a braid of tenderness suffuses his darkness:
“Leave the welts on your table to melt in the night,
the lasts will walk away, your chair
will fold onto itself,” she intones lulling him.
She loosens her red hair
baring her neck down to the screaming lights
tearing her apart, her shoes bursting
at the tips, the soles flying
lost in the woods where the elves
now ghosts in the well catch and keep.
She knocks on her bare feet–
the mourning doves unfurl their despair.
She pushes the door open. The half light exhales
stale air from his chair. Up close his head bent
as if intent on her shoes–a spider web
wraps his beard, tighten his lips unsmiling.
(c) Alegria Imperial
Composed from a photo prompt by Rob Hanson and posted for One Shoot Sunday at One Stop Poetry, THE gathering place for poets and artists who share their passion for their art while nurturing each other. Come join us!
…the white cat’s eyes and …some truths under the sun (cat haiku for today ‘Hug Your Cat Day’)
Also for June: ‘Adopt-a-Cat’ month
Daily Haiku Selection
April 22, 2011
(Mainichi, Japan)
winter sky–
the white cat’s eyes
bluer—
Alegria Imperial (Vancouver, Canada)
Dili, the inspiration for the haiku
Dili, the fluffy 3-year old male cat, inspired this haiku. He’s not mine but a friend’s. But I do feed his brother, Divo, and him when their mom or dad can’t get home on time for their supper. Divo, a gentle tabby, takes care of Dili. Both are adopted; no, Dili, was picked up from a roadside in Dildo, Newfoundland (yes, there’s such a town), meowing his way into the entrance of an inn his would-be parents had checked in.
His dad describes him as a “furry snow ball the size of his palm”. Even then, his dad noted his wide cushioned paws. They had waited until they would have had to fly back to Vancouver if anyone would come around looking for him–no one did. Wrapped in a box, Dili, on that rigorous flight ruffled the vacuum packed air with his constant whining and restlessness.
In his new home, here in Vancouver, none of that energy and compulsion to make sounds abated. He meowed into his parent’s half-dreams; they woke up from his ‘screams’. He was declared deaf by the vet. But of course, he’s all-white and blue-eyed,isn’t he? Yes, both azure blue unlike some with one eye green, hence, not deaf.
In three months after troubled sleep but alternating with delight at his crystal stare and the cotton-feel of his fur, his mom and dad walked into an Animal Shelter, where in their research seemed to have the most cared strays, and met Divo. Their mom recalls how he cuddled up to her from her very first touch. This sweet boy to this day gives his mom massages, kisses and cuddles, listening to her coo, thanking him.
Dili and Divo have grown as true brothers. Dili, an acute observer of movements–he even lip reads–takes cues from Divo. But sometimes, Divo knowing of his deafness, sometimes springs up behind Dili, which begins a mock tussle. Their bond have tightened like it were of twins–of the spirit if indeed as God’s creatures they do have.
the eyes–
some truths under the sun
in Dili’s and Divo’s
Divo, the contortionist
Doves (a haibun for One Shot Wednesday)
The dove pair stopped cooing today.
Last time I glimpsed them, each moved listless in the cage – tails fanning each other’s snow head, red eyes spying mine. No one could come near. Each guarded the other like furious sentries. Could they have known they made such a handsome pair?
The white pair would not leave the dovecote. I caught them glance the brown too common flock; and then they turned away, lidless red eyes back to each other.
all I can see
what I cannot see
in your eyes
The white doves were at a wedding today cooped up, as perhaps they would have wished in a bell. When the newlyweds tugged at a string, the doves fell together – confused by the crowd, helpless in the grasp of the bride and groom. When tossed up again, their wings seemed weak. For the first time, they flew away from each other each clutching at light cords hung from the ceiling of the room where a wedding party was rising to a pitch. Their webbed feet quivered uncertain of their hold, their eyes redder, blinking with fear; they trembled as if they had lost their wings.
Now the crowd worked at a game with the white pair as pawns. Whoever caught one of the pair would think it a prize. What a prize–the glee bubbled off their laughter. The crowd did not know; how could they?
riddle:
when do heartbeats rhyme
in what beat end?
In freedom, a gaping cave awaits to trap lovers or a mess of strings. For the doves, loss of the other is sorrow that stones a tiny heart.
Copyright (c) by Alegria Imperial 2011
Posted for One Shot Wednesday at One Stop Poetry, the inimitable gathering place for poets and artists. Check us out.
About
autumn wind
wondering about lilies
in a mountain pond
Tell me a writer who really gets a satisfying jornal, in Spanish a daily wage or its equivalent, and I’ll bare a spirit in constant bouts of doubtfulness. Does a writer earn more because of what he writes and how he does it? Or is a writer paid more or less because of who he is? Is it money or honor he expects to receive?
Ahhh … but money as wage, and praise or honor as reward would be too predictable, too common as Job lamented in the Book of Job. It is in these lines that read: “Is not man’s life on earth nothing more than pressed service, his times no better than hired drudgery? Like the slave, sighing for the shade, or the workman with no thought but his wages, months of delusion I have assigned to me, nothing for my own but nights of grief. Lying in bed I wonder, ‘When will it be day?’ Risen I think, ‘How slowly evening comes!’
Restlessly I fret till twilight falls. Swifter than a weaver’s shuttle my days have passed, and vanished, leaving no hope behind. Remember that my life is but a breath, and that my eyes will never again see joy.”
Not money but joy is the ultimate wage as the passage implies. And joy is not hard to earn for it is in everyday life if we have eyes to see, a nose to smell, fingers to touch, ears to hear–a heart beating. This to me, is how a writer earns a daily wage. His wages then take the guise of treasures his heart can transfigure into a universe of thought that taps into other hearts, that causes a swirl in the depth of other souls, or that makes wings to sprout on leaden heels.
Sometimes not joy but rueful, poignant moments are my pick. Take what I earned once: On my walk home in my neighborhood, I caught two clumps of snowdrops–such tiny blossoms smaller than fingertips that do not look up but shyly droop close to black patches on the ground winter has frozen. That afternoon in the frosty wind, they trembled as if ready to turn away and run but how could they? For that poignant moment on seeing the wintry rain beat on the fragile snowdrop–as if pushing it to go home now, go to sleep–I earned my jornal, my daily wage.
Once on summer walk, the crackle of dried leaves just hit me both like the laughter of children and sobs long suppressed. Neither one of them would resolve the dryness, but I recalled how each does bring tears: laughter for joy, sobs for healing that comes with the release of a dammed-up pain. My jornal that day came as two haiku.
Fall has since shortened the day and the heart begins to crave for lost space that it doesn’t even recall which or where. I feel that most treasures have turned into mush so much so I wouldn’t be able to sift them off the ground. Yet I caught the dying day yesterday–so glorious in the gold of autumn it opened a flip side of serene heaven. Blades of grass coated in diadems of rain that carpet the lawns render royal walks poor by imitation. A burst of red maple against an inky blue sky humbled me, a soul bragging about her skill to recreate beauty in words.
I suppose I’m taking Job’s reflections to heart. I’d rather not gloss over each day and look beyond what’s there, right before me, or else fragile as is my breath one day “my eyes may never again see joy” to write. With what then will I compare the eternal joy, the ultimate wage I await?
Yet for now, as other eyes hanker to make the invisible visible, I put a tag on some moments of joy. Like on seeing the snowdrops, I paid myself $200 as my jornal.
What could have been yours?
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jornales 
abducted fireflies (haiga7 for 19 Planets Art Blog)
haiga7 for haiga-a-day made with clip art on Microsoft Publisher
abducted fireflies
glowing in its eyes
frog
Another post for Rick Daddario’s haiga-a-day challenge at 19 Planets Art Blog, which I created from a clip art on Microsoft Publisher.
And what’s behind the image of the frog? This…
Noticing what could be unseen or merely imagined, magnifying the significance of what would be otherwise, some speck lost in the swarm of air particulates, this is what poetry, especially haiku, does to me. My mind cannot seem to work within limitations of space and time, or even sensations. What’s beyond a simple object in a single moment becomes a truth that breaks through thought barriers. Take the frog.
Basho has immortalized its break out of anonymity with his famous haiku, ‘old pond’. Reading it again and again, one steps into the monastic peace of an old pond until a frog that one hardly notices among stones, plops, and animates the peace with the sound of water. In a moment, the old pond turns into a universal moment of any moment that once was lifeless, suddenly, breathing from the unexpected.
My haiga is hardly a takeoff from Basho’s frog. It does not have the quietness of it, nor of the objective quality that identifies the poet as the observer but in whose mind, reality is arranged into three lines that total into a truth. While an observation as well, mine is less objective in that I state what I suppose in what I see, namely, the glow in a frog’s eye–seen especially in the dark. Knowing what it feeds on, I imagine fireflies and connect it with that glow. In reality, it is far-fetched as we know that anything creatures eat ends up far from the eyes, in the stomach. If a glow ever shows in the eye, it is that of satisfaction. But what I have done here, or think so, anyway, is tweak reality and made it slide into poetic thought, some other truth.
September 16, 2011 Posted by alee9 | comment, haiga, haiku, poetry, reflection | 19 Planets Art blog, alegria imperial, Basho, clip art, creatures, Daily life, Daily wage, dark, eyes, fireflies, frog, haiga-a-day, haiku, haiku moment, jornales, Microsoft Publisher, objective, peace, pond, reality, Rick Daddario, sensations, sound of water, space, stomach, stones, time, unexpected, universal moment | 4 Comments