the fire’s ashes
no time to taste
what we’ve been given
tasting
August 11: 1-7: Roy G. Biv
1. a red wheelbarrow this time there’s no significance
2. that last shriveled orange those last two drops of juice
3. he never trusted yellow until he tasted lemonade
4. asking for green and being given an uncertain shade of blue
5. there will always be more blue than anything else
6. the indigo pods that shake in the autumn wind beetles dying
7. trying to revive her the child holds violets to her nose
May 31: 2-10: Russian memories
sun hanging low
long line for Cuban
oranges
zoo in midwinter
the boy in heavy clothes
cries, “Eagle!”
spring tram journey
high-rises hemmed in
by birch forest
frost on the window
blini
with coarse sugar
laundromat steam
the breath
of sleeping cats
sick from lack of sun
a lemon drop from
a fur-hatted woman
blooming bulbs
children play
near the famous prison
warm riverbank
smell of fish
from the store called “Ocean”
melted snow
reveals worn lettering:
Faster, Higher, Stronger
*
I’ve been wanting to try to experiment with writing haiku from very old memories. Do haiku moments need to be captured when fresh, or can you let them mellow for a while? Might the moments that you still remember after so long actually be better candidates for poetry than the fleeting glimpses of things that briefly move you today?
Twenty years ago I spent a semester in Moscow, then the capital of the Soviet Union. It was a life-changing time in many ways — for one thing, I met my husband there. (He’s an American, in case you were wondering.) For another, it was a world so different from the one I was used to that I got used to staring at things and noticing them, which is good practice for a writer. There are still so many tiny moments of astonishment that flash across my brain from that time.
I will say, though — I don’t think most of them really fit themselves well to haiku, maybe because my mind was relentlessly prosy then. I keep wanting to write whole essays about them, describing the whole surrounding scene and pretentiously analyzing cultural differences. Or maybe it really is futile to write haiku about things that happened so long ago; maybe you need to seize on haiku moments the moment you see them.
May 27: 1 (Chewing on Grass Stalk)
chewing on grass stalk
teeth and tongue
remembering
May 23: 1-30: My father
1.
freeze after thaw
cell phone ring
makes me slip on the ice
2.
colder than yesterday
my sister’s voice
on the phone
3.
on my back on the ice
clouds torn open
reveal more clouds
4.
cell phone ring
the airport
vanishes
5.
a stranger’s car
roads darker than I’m used to
curve toward home
6.
snow on dark steps
inside
the family waits
7.
pancakes heavy
in my stomach
throwing out his painkillers
8.
the day after his death
the death of the neighbor’s dog
we sympathize
9.
cold draft in his room
the cards
we used to play with
10.
knocking with cold hands
at the wrong door
of the funeral home
11.
list of funeral expenses
scratches on
the polished table
12.
early dark
white sheet pulled away
from his surprised face
13.
snow on a low wall
choosing between
two burial places
14.
PowerPoint slides
of gravestones
chairs with hard seats
15.
stack of Sunday papers
can’t stop reading
the obituary
16.
morning fog
running up the hills
I left behind
17.
trying on dresses
my sister’s
opinion
18.
Olympic snowboarding
I blow my nose
on his handkerchiefs
19.
thin pajamas
Googling the words of
his favorite hymn
20.
steam from my mother’s tea
showing her
Facebook condolences
21.
day of the funeral
rust from the leaky
faucet
22.
unheated waiting room
one by one
we put coats back on
23.
my father’s funeral
truth
and lies
24.
standing for a hymn
memory of my head
reaching his elbow
25.
minister’s hug
his sympathy card
will regret my unbelief
26.
frost on the windowpane
unfamiliar
relatives
27.
their sympathy
taste of
sweet red punch
28.
snow in the cemetery
wrong kind
of shoes
29.
fresh snow on his car
another
dead battery
30.
my inheritance
a car to drive
a thousand miles home
*
My father died in February. I’d made no effort whatsoever to write about his death before. Or speak about it, really. Or think about it, come to think about it.
Something about haiku makes it easier, by forcing you to remember and concentrate on the tiny physical details of the experience. Writing these has been like compiling a mental photo album of the week of his death. It’s allowed both distance and immediacy. I approach the experience, come close enough to touch it, then draw back quickly, as soon as I start to feel it burn.
Red Dragonfly 