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quill scratching a poem where it hurts
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NaHaiWriMo prompt: feather
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quill scratching a poem where it hurts
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NaHaiWriMo prompt: feather
A new downloadable book was made available on the 16th of November 2012 by Michael Dylan Welch, writer and poet, and founder of the NaHaiWriMo site and FB community. Titled “With Cherries on Top: 31 Flavors of NaHaiWriMo,” it is a sparkler of haiku, senryu, and micropoetry. It is excellently designed and presented, with fantastic photography, and also well-proof-read by Christina Nguyen. A haiku fireworks to enjoy on many a winter evening.

This is how Michael Dylan Welch introduces it:
“In August of 2012, the NaHaiWriMo page on Facebook featured daily writing prompts from 31 different prompters. Each prompter selected at least five of his or her favourite poems written in response. Michael Dylan Welch selected from these poems to produce the online PDF book, With Cherries on Top: 31 Flavors from NaHaiWriMo”
This book is available for free download, from www.nahaiwrimo.com
I am honored to have a few haiku of my own included, and to have been one of the 31 prompters of the month!
last leaf —
she closes
her eyes
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NaHaiWriMo prompt: last leaf
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lightning she swallows the pit in her stomach
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NaHaiWriMo prompt: children
Syntagma Square
a marble head rolls
off its plinth
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NaHaiWriMo prompt: landmark
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For Syntagma Square see here
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This poem alludes to G. Seferis’ lines (see below) about the ‘Greek problem’ of ‘having’ to live up to their
ancient ancestors…and not knowing how to, of course.
I woke with this marble head in my hands;
It exhausts my elbows and I don’t know where to put it down.
It was falling into the dream as I was coming out of the dream.
So our life became one and it will be very difficult for it to separate again
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From Mythistorema, copied from wiki
The link here
While my first book of poetry, “In the Garden of Absence” is at the printers, being fitted into its paper dress, smoothed, sewn, and shaped physically into a book I can hold in my hands, I’d like to say
a huge thank you to Michael Dylan Welch for his generous Afterword “Presence in Absence.”
Also a huge thank you to my daughter Maria Pierides for her permission to use one of her paintings, “Welsh Hill,” for the book cover, Maria Pierides and Rubin Eynon for designing the cover, and Thomas Geyer for his help with formatting the print edition.
Special thanks to the members of the nurturing NaHaiWriMo Facebook community (now over 1000 people!) for their continuing inspiration, warm support, and encouragement.
crumbling stucco
an angel in gold leaf
ready to fall
1
winter grass
feeding the lost pigeons
2
winter reeds
a dove becomes
my friend
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NaHaiWriMo prompt: peace
Interesting to be reminded today that doves and pigeons,
together with the olive branch have been used as
symbols for peace, love, lust as well as the human and Holy spirit since
antiquity, and featured widely in ancient Greek
mythology, Judaism, Christianity, Hinduism and other religions
and cultures.
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On another note, haiku #1 is a two-liner. I did try to twist it
into the more usual three- and one- line shapes, but
it wouldn’t listen to me.
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whistling through deserted streets shrapnel
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NaHaiWriMo prompt: war. A difficult prompt to respond to… so many past wars, so many going on today… I opted for a single moment, the sound of flying shrapnel, the danger of it.
poacher’s moon
a crocus knows how
to wait
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NaHaiWriMo prompt: crescent (old) moon. My response to this prompt is off-key!
mistaking
angel moths for angels
misted glass…
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NaHaiWriMo prompt: insects
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round earth
I wake up to the sound
of doves cooing
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NaHaiWriMo prompt: awakening
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storming all night –
I get to see the other
side of the leaf
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NaHaiWriMo prompt: storm
hunter’s moon
the squelch of his boot
by the creek
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NaHaiWriMo prompt: river/stream
the shadows
left by your absence —
November
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melting chocolate on my tongue bubbling stream
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NaHaiWriMo prompt: flavor
Prompter for October 2012: Scott Abeles
This coming Thursday, the 1st of November, is the first ever Mindful Writing Day, organised by Kaspa & Fiona at their blog ‘Writing Our Way Home.’
To join-in, simply slow down, pay attention to one thing and write down a few words from this experience (thus producing what is called a ‘small stone’).
Fiona and Kaspa claim that ‘small stones’ are easy to write, and that they will help you connect to the world. Once you’ve started, you might not want to stop… I concur! You might want to polish your little ones too, expand them into a longer poem, or shrink them, prune them and polish them into a micropoem or haiku. It is up to you!
As an additional bonus, if you visit ‘Writing Our Way Home’ on Thursday you’ll find out how to download your free kindle copy of the new anthology, ‘A Blackbird Sings: a book of short poems‘. This is a lovely, richly-textured book of poetry and prose by several contributors who have been writing small stones this year. Two of my own poems are included in this book.
If you do write, you can submit your small stone and see it published on the blog, and be entered into a competition to win one of five paperback copies of the book.
I will be taking part. In fact, taking part in the Facebook community NaHaiWriMo (National Haiku Writing Month) which is on-going all through the year, I have been writing ‘smalls stones’ every day, several of them haiku, and have been posting at least one a day every day. For me to do something different on this Mindful Writing Day, may amount to not writing at all! Just joking, I couldn’t stop, if I tried!
But if, say if, you do not feel like putting pen to paper, or fingertips to laptop keys, you might visit the blog anyway, and read what the others have written; or start visiting the site of the The Haiku Foundation, in order to read one haiku a day, every day, expertly chosen for you by monthly poetry editors. You will find this feature in the Per Diem: Daily Haiku panel, at the right hand lower corner of the Foundation Homepage. For the link click here
Whatever you decide to do, don’t forget to look at the sky. It is always there…
What difference a week makes…
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blood moon landscape painting with angels
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NaHaiWriMo prompt: stranger
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Blood moon, or Hunter’s moon, refer to the first full moon after the Harvest moon, in October. The light of the moon was used by hunters to track and kill their prey, stockpiling food before the winter cold set in. The link between Blood moon and angels is for my reader to make…
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..
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harvest moon
the poet’s tea
getting cold
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lune des moissons
le thé du poète
refroidit
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NaHaiWriMo prompt: poet
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Transl. Vincent Hoarau – thank you, Vincent!
Vincent’s blog, La Calebasse, in French, with several poems in English, can be read here
first
heart tattoo on her arm
rest home
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NaHaiWriMo prompt: tattoo
radio silence
I dead-head
the Busy Lizzies
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(Busy Lizzie: flower Impatiens)
NaHaiWriMo prompt: non-verbal communication
lost in thought –
his tongue caressing the crown
on his molar
NaHaiWriMo prompt: lost
Inspired by Lee Gurga’s THF Per Diem haiku ‘professional conference’!
For a day only, today, 22 October 2012, it will be available to read on the The Haiku Foundation website, in the Per Diem: Daily Haiku panel by clicking here
daily grind
the river makes its way
to the horizon
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NaHaiWriMo prompt: horizon
bonfire
the bare bones
of our argument
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NaHaiWriMo prompt:bones
1
pins and needles —
the sharp pinpricks
of flying sand
2
echoing caves —
smooth tongues
of the Eurocrats
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NaHaiWriMo prompt: echo
1
autumn market stall
the refugee’s child feeds
the doves
2
child feeding the doves –
on the statue of Ares
vulture’s nest
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NaHaiWriMo prompt: socially engaged haiku
The social issue: the alarming xenophobia rising/social disintegration taking place in Greece
at present: see BBC report here
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Alpha Centauri
a fallen angel’s
fossil footprints
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NaHaiWriMo prompt: footprint(s)
In addition, I was fascinated and inspired by the following news in The Independent newspaper:
Scientists find Earth-sized planet Alpha Centauri Bb in neighbouring star system