This week’s haibun Monday is about compassion, but we are to write about it without explicitly stating it.
Many people suffered with me willingly, giving positivity, thoughts, prayers, being there for late-night phone calls and parked-car conversations. They modeled true friendship, which I can never forget. They saved my life in body, and even more in mind and spirit.
Winter’s frost is thawed.
Friends are the warm cup of tea,
Comfort like blankets.
This haibun was inspired by today’s NaPoWriMo prompt. I did not follow it exactly, as we were supposed to use a description of what was outside our window as the beginning of an erasure poem, but I simply turned the description into a haibun. Shared with DVerse open link night.
Outside the window of this coffee shop, cars drive by, close to the freeway. There’s a gray, chain-link fence and a bank of bushes between here and the street. The sun hasn’t set yet, probably will not for another couple of hours.
On my way walking here, a truck-full of friends called my name and waved from across the intersection. I’m still wondering who they all were, though one of them looked familiar.
Rushing river, with
Stones trying to stop its flow —
The water moves on.
This week’s haibun Monday prompt uses the Japanese term chijitsu, which means “lingering day”or “long spring day.” It was full of nostalgia for me. I do love when the days get longer, and the evening stretches out.
Late-spring and summer evenings, my family enjoyed eating dinner outside in our backyard, among the flowering plants and the twilit warmth. We would imitate the sunlight by lingering over plates of home-cooked food, often barbequed, and entertaining conversation. During these leisurely meals, we shared a special closeness and camaraderie that did not seem to be present during other seasons. These memories are long-lasting, rare but happy.
Like a cat sunlight
Languishes, stretches, but then:
Necessary night
This week at DVerse, we are writing haibun about faith. I could write countless poems on this topic, but here’s just one. This is also for NaPoWriMo day 2.
When we were young, my older brother asked me if I believed in angels. When I said, “Yes,” he replied, “Really?” derisively. After that, I thought that I was wrong, that angels couldn’t exist because my brother had said that they didn’t.
I don’t think the same way anymore: I do believe in God, and in angels, and in the value of my point of view.
Sapling supported
In early spring, now stands tall
Rooted, and branching.
It is haibun Monday at DVerse once again. This week, Toni is asking us about who inspired us to write, what our style is, and why we write. Join us at the link above!
My first journal entry
I have been writing since I was a small child, from my first journal at 5 years old and my second-grade teacher providing time to write in class. She supported my every attempt to write stories and poetry, even the most insane rhymes. Since then, and especially during the last few years, I have written in many styles. It is hard to find a favorite, as I naturally like variety.
As for why I write poetry, it definitely began as a need for self-expression and has now become such a part of me that I can’t imagine not writing each and every day.
Clouds across the sky
Writing weather predictions
Welcome the spring rains
This week at DVerse, we are writing haibun about something grey. It took me a little while to come up with an idea, but here it is.
My mother dyes her hair again, roots becoming grey again. She, like many, is afraid of ageing, afraid of grey. I have tried to tell her: It is better than the alternative.
Admiring the roots
Pushing through, proud of the truth
You are still alive.
I wrote this haibun for DVerse poetics, inspired by the prompt about pentimento, or changing one’s mind. This Italian word is where the English word repentance comes from. I felt a little weird writing a haibun for this prompt, since it is not a Monday, but any form is okay for this.
When people hear that I began as a chemical engineering major, they are amazed at my current French studies, a complete 180 degree turn. I changed college plans because despite being good at math and science, I didn’t have nearly the same passion that I had, and still have, about language. Engineers do make a lot of money, but, as cliché as it sounds, money doesn’t mean that much to me. I think that enjoyment of a job can be part of the payment.
Completely new path,
Unknown as a foreign tongue —
Where does it turn now?
