FROM THE NOTEBOOK

Springtime belongs to children, writes Yuji Hayashi in Kita-Kyushu. The Hayashi family celebrated Children's Day to culminate a weeklong holiday away from school.

Tomonori Ono composed a haiku describing how children in Honolulu spend their free time.

Dad, ladybug!
echoes throughout house
spring, at last

Playing children laugh
catching praying mantis
blue summer sky

The famous Ultraman was thanked by children for saving their shopping mall from monsters, reports Satoru Kanematsu from Nagoya.

On the same busy day in Bucharest, Romania, Vasile Moldovan sat back and enjoyed a carefree day watching children fly kites.

Shaking hands
with superhero
Children's Day

Kites sailing
in the spring breeze ...
Children's Day

Being the eldest son, Ryosuke Yamate's family honored his recent entry into dental school by hoisting a blue carp streamer high in the sky over his home in Saga. Rika Haraguchi had just began studying to be a nurse when her best friend gave birth. Her classmate Yukie Nakazono penned a poem in honor of the famous nurse, Florence Nightingale, who shares her family name with a sweet-singing nocturnal bird.

Looking up
swims comfortably
carp streamer

Baby bud
twinkle of new life
nursing school

Mild season
spirited singing
Nightingale

Ayano Oki was stirred by songs flowing on the winds over Kagoshima. Francis Attard watched a skylark fly solo over his home in Malta.

A blue sky
the song which I hear
wind of spring

Lark soars
all alone in the distance
it keeps

In Utsunomiya, Eikou Satou was troubled by yellow sand carried over the seas by westerly winds that originated in Mongolia.

Norbert Stein seems to have spent a worrisome week in Germany.

Cherry petals
blown by yellow winds
From the far west

Mother calls--
her spring child
lost in time

Shizuka Suzuki tried a new shade of lipstick. Noriko Yoshida and John Martone felt content just to stay home.

Applying
new color lipstick
shyest pink

The spring storm
watching an opera
till dawn

Woke up
happy
in spring clothes

Want to try composing haiku ?

Back numbers

The next issue of the Asahi Haikuist Network appears May 19. Send early summer haiku to David McMurray at the International Herald Tribune/Asahi Shimbun, 5-3-2 Tsukiji, Chuo-ku, Tokyo 104-8011, by fax to 03-5541-8539, or by e-mail to <is@asahi.com>.