MITSUAKI KOJIMA

　Cold weather continues to chill the haiku poets who venture outside to pen images of humanity interacting with nature. Marites C. Omori caught sight of a white, cold sunset settling down on the farmlands in Yamanashi Prefecture. Her gesture is followed by another near wordless poem penned by Vasile Moldovan while watching the sun rise in Bucharest, Romania.

Cold sunset
neighbor sees it too
simple bows

The spring dawn
a wordless haiku:
sounds of birds

　Rita Bletgen-in't Hout was walking in a cemetery in the Netherlands when she composed the next winter poem about three crows seemingly taking part in a funeral procession. Tom Dean goes for a walk every day with fellow poet Seiko Yoshinaga in the University of Wisconsin nature preserve. While walking they arranged the next haiku together. The arboretum is home to owls, herons, mallard ducks and Canadian geese, but in winter the crows are king.

Silent world
crows hunch in the snow
funeral

Black leaves on bare trees
erupt into sudden flight
swirling-caw caw caw

　Michael Corr was contacted in Nagoya by a ham radio operator in Seattle. With tongue-in-cheek, the second line of his poem tries to emulate the sounds emanating from his inexpensive equipment. His poem is followed by one from Australian Lorne Henry who bought some packaged pebbles for her tropical fish tank. It struck her as being peculiar that the pebbles were identified as being manufactured.

Radio
shack chip cheep cheep cheep
ham Japan

Made in China
aquarium accoutrements
river pebbles

　Japan Overseas Educational Services (JOES) recently published the results of a haiku contest held for 453 students in their Kansai and Kanto area schools. The next haiku by Yukiko Wada was judged as one of the best haiku among junior high school students. Congratulations also go to fourth-grader Nao Fujimoto in Kobe who was chosen grand champion by the judges who prized her "touch of dark with the light" and "wonderful, dark, desperate imagery."

Nice and warm spring day
behind a parked car
I found a dandelion

I saw a dead ant
he was one step away from
the sugar cube

　The haiku world has been saddened by the loss of Kazuo Sato-haiku poet and critic-who passed away Feb. 20 after a long bout with cancer. Born and raised in Tokyo, the late professor emeritus of Waseda University studied English literature with R. H. Blyth; engaged in the comparative study of haiku and was the founding director of the International Division, Museum of Haiku Literature, Tokyo.

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