Mitsuaki Kojima

　Spring onions, tea, Irish mist, ducks and a heron color our haiku column in various shades of green this week.

　Charlie Smith in North Carolina dated the next haiku as March 17, as did Kolompar in the one that follows.

Green onions
adorn rock garden
St. Patrick's

t. Patrick's Day
a green shamrock
floats in the beer

　Some of our haikuists might have been imbibing on St. Patrick's Day, but in the next poem Trevor Camp seems more intoxicated by the lovely warmth of spring sunshine.

　He favors a 3-5-3 syllable form when he composes haiku. He recently authored ``Haiku Seasons," a wallet-sized publication that he calls an artist's trading book. He also makes haiku trading cards that are printed by Ancaster Small Press, 784 Haig Road, Ancaster, Canada.

Spring sunshine
drunk after winter
good white wine

　Vermillion-Heron also sent this next haiku that captures a special moment during a trip to see the amazing wildflowers of the Anza-Borrego Desert near San Diego.

Comets hit the sand
explosions of green buttons
ocotillo leaves

　For two glorious weeks, the entire Colorado Desert in Southeast California becomes a multi-colored carpet, before drying into bleak sand dunes for another year. Ocotillo are vivid green cacti with bright red blossoms.

　The peak bloom period is this weekend according to park officials. It is a sight not to be missed. If you would like to be notified 2 weeks prior to next year's full bloom send an International Reply Coupon with a self-addressed postcard to Wildflowers, 200 Palm Canyon Drive, Borrego Springs, California, 92004, United States.

Want to try composing haiku ?

Back numbers

Readers are invited to send haiku for the season to David McMurray at the Asahi Haikuist Network, International Herald Tribune/Asahi Shimbun, 5-3-2 Tsukiji, Chuo-ku, Tokyo 104-8011.