Autumn Moon

moon, stars, darkness, wind
even the mountains forget
their names


Modern American haikuist Clark Strand wrote, “My Japanese Zen teacher used to say, ‘No dress rehearsal!’ He meant, ‘This is it! Now! This moment of life is unrepeatable.’” For me this evokes the contradictory emotions of being both scared and relieved at the same time. Kind of like that moment when the roller coaster clatters up to the station and you and the other thrill seekers all jump into the little metal seats at the same time. Hurry, hurry the moment is leaving...

October Indiana--Such a Grand, Glorious Canvas

in my pocket
yesterday's leaves--
sough of wind


We offered our haiku workshop yesterday at the library; it was co-sponsored by the Writers' Guild at Bloomington. Nancy Long organized and led an interesting outdoor exercise. She sent us to record five or more images that we noticed near the library and then advised us also to search for things that looked totally out of place or were unexpected. Funny when you turned on your radar to scout for them, it was amazing how many unusual things showed up.

Even though it's been very dry for days I noticed a large, almost water-like stain coating the sidewalk. Also, spilled and solidified around a light pole, I saw what looked like dried chocolate ice cream. Also, a bit out of place, were two vultures soaring right over downtown. The leaves were all crimson or sported that flamboyant last-blast yellow. I couldn't help wandering how the leaves looked to the raptors flying above.

The workshop participants came back and wrote about what they saw. I was impressed with the "deep seeing" that everyone did. And how people wrote about the same image with such an individual touch.

In preparation, I read haiku books and articles for days--saturated now but in a nice way. Haiku snippets from across the centuries reel through my head as I stroll through a world riotously autumn.

An Early Female Haiku Writer

on the ebb tide beach
everything we pick up
is alive

--Chiyo ni

I mentioned earlier that there were four great Japanese haiku masters: Bashō, Buson, Issa, and Shiki. Well, I've recently discovered a fifth, Chiyo-ni, the only woman. The long chain group poems, hakai no renga, from which haiku developed had been written only be men. Japanese women--the few during this medieval time period that learned to read and write--wrote in another form, tanka.

Chiyo-ni was a contemporary of Buson; she lived between 1703-1775. According to critic Jane Reichhold, her real name was Kaga-no Chiyo and she was born in Matsuto. She taught herself haiku when she was only fifteen--she had no choice, because she was a woman no haiku master would instruct her. Later in life she met and worked with other haiku writers but by this time she had fully established herself as a great haikuist. In later life she became a Buddhist nun. She was also an accomplished painter, something you might infer from her choice of evocative images.

Here are a few more of her haiku:

the coolness ---
on the bottom of her kimono
in the bamboo grove

waterweed
floating away, despite
the butterfly’s weight on it

again the women
come to the fields
with unkempt hair

leaves like bird shadows
desolate---
the winter moon

the lake knows
where she is going--
why don't I?


I love the play of light upon water, and how even a man-made lake such as Monroe can give a feeling of wildness, of possible journeys.

"Weather-Beaten Bones"

No inspiration for a haiku despite this brilliant fall morning, but I've been reading Basho's Travelogue of Weather-Beaten Bones (translated by Sam Hamill.) Love the title and sense of hope, and yes, even adventure, that it implies. Yep, in spite of aches and decidedly unlimber bones, I'm going to set out on a long arduous journey.

Here's how it begins, "I left my rundown hut beside the river during the eighth month of 1684, placing my trust in my walking stick and in the words of the Chinese sage who said, 'I pack no provisions for my long journey--entering emptiness under the midnight moon. The voice of the wind was oddly cold.'"

"Entering emptiness under the midnight moon" -- lovely phrase. Isn't that how all journeys start?--maybe not with the moon, but with not knowing what is ahead, what the journey will bring. What changes the journey will cause? And how memories will soon fill the journey/journal pages.

Here's a few travel quotes I came across recently.

“One’s destination is never a place, but a new way of seeing things.” – Henry Miller

″A traveler without observation is a bird without wings.” – Moslih Eddin Saadi

“To awaken quite alone in a strange town is one of the pleasantest sensations in the world.” – Freya Stark

I find Miller's particularly apt because the best journeys always evoke changes in your world-view.

Basho sounds so old and frail here so out of curiosity I had to do the life-math. He was born in 1644, so when he wrote these words he was an old man of 40!! (emphasis indeed added.)

Here's one haiku from this journey that I particularly like:

along the roadside,
blossoming wild roses
in my horse's mouth

The Crows Know

six crows
silent in a field—
noon whistle




Photo attribution: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/deed.en
"Black crow, black crow, tell me where you really go" by monkeyc.net

Olympic Peninsula Beach

minus tide beach
seal pups barking so loud
that ravens hide





This beach was a three mile hike from the road mostly on a boardwalk through a deep forest. When I finally saw an opening in the trees with light pouring through, I began to hear this intense racket: gulls calling, a few ravens cawing, and what sounded like thousands of seal pups barking in the water near the island. Not a quiet beach at all, but breathtakingly beautiful. I wanted to stay and watch the sunset--ribbons of clouds forming in the west promised that it would be spectacular--but I didn't dare attempt to walk back in the near-darkness. The cedars and spruce were so thick that the forest was fairly dark even in full daylight. Ah, I will have to go back.

A snake with the dreaded three colors--red, black and yellow--slithered across the boards, hurrying home too.