asahi.com : Asahi Haikuist Network

Mar 26-27, 2005

	No reason: calling late mother spring dusk -Reiko Nishimura (Kumamoto)		A hot soak in the bathtub gazing at my navel -Tim Chamberlain (London)

	Submerged in the bathtub heart beating correctly -Nobuko Masakawa (Osaka)		Thanking God for the energy: three sneezes -Sagami Matsuda (Osaka)

	You are here today but you'll be gone tomorrow: wild cherry blossom -Ella Rutledge (Tokyo)		Sneaking out cockroach from a drawer early spring -Teruko Omoto (Osaka-Sayama)

	When I was a deer a stroll in the afternoon eating sakura -Jaakko Saari (Finland)		Downtown bus the scent of her still- fifty years -J.D. Heskin (Minnesota)

	Around the edges restless ocean waves splashing at the moon -Susan Marie LaVallee (Hawaii)

MITSUAKI KOJIMA

　Next week the Asahi Haikuist reaches its 10-year milestone. Readers can look forward to some refreshing new poems from haikuists like Yukiko Yamada in Tokyo who seems ready to zoom into this spring and Romanian poet Serban Codrin who has found a shortcut on his way to his favorite moon-viewing post.

A bee's buzz
toward almond blossoms
directly

A new way:
breach through the fence
the spring moon

　Looking back can also be an enriching haiku experience. Since April 1995 poets from around the world have been contributing haiku by postcard, fax and e-mail. Some contributions have been scratched on bits of paper at haiku meetings and conferences. Tim Chamberlain fondly remembers touring Japan last year to exhibit artifacts from the British Museum. He picked up souvenirs and stamped his notebook to jog his memory, but he's also retained nostalgic experiences by setting them in haiku form. He found new ways of looking at things, and he found heaven at Todai-ji temple in Nara.

Lamp posts at odd angles
a reflection
in the water

Passing through a gate
paradise contained
in a child's smile

　Like spring rain, our readers' haiku pour in at a rate of 100 poems a day.
　And they've kept on coming through every change of weather and season. From over 300,000 entries, 7,500 poems have so far been featured in the above column or analyzed in this From the Notebook section. Michael Corr composes a poem a day in Nagoya-never missing a chance to share a defining moment. Marshall Hryciuk sends a much appreciated envelope once in a blue moon from Toronto.

Just March with
the tea house's last
camellia

looking for envelopes
under my window
wind fresh after rain

　Some poets have gone on to author books and win contests. Others have grown too weak to write, but still enjoy hearing from 3-5-3 veterans such as high school teacher Satoru Kanematsu. And budding poets-taught by some of our haikuists at universities and haiku clubs-are taking up the pen.

Clown visits
kids in the sickroom
bringing spring

Want to try composing haiku ?

Back numbers

The Asahi Haikuist Network will appear on the first and third Saturdays of each month starting from April. Readers can mail haiku to David McMurray at the Asahi Haikuist Network, International Herald Tribune/Asahi Shimbun, 5-3-2 Tsukiji, Chuo-ku, Tokyo 104-8011 or fax 03-5541-8539.

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