Tag: haiku

What is Haiku

snowy trail

“Haiku is a form of Zen.” — R. H. Blyth

Let’s not be wordy,
Precise, concise, shades of truth
Wisdom with few words

Ah — a verbal act
by defying convention
gets right to the point

A verbal act —
Frost, clinging to red roses —
Disappears like dew.

— Bashō no yōna, January 2026

Haiku draws on memory. It condenses and colors. It takes a scene and gives it meaning beyond its mere description. The last haiku was inspired by a red rose that still clung to a branch along Clear Creek in Golden, Colorado in December, 2025. I had just finished a three mile run up and back Clear Creek Trail. There was ice at the edge of the creek, but in the middle of the creek the water flowed smoothly and clear, like the name of the creek. The rose at the end of the run was like a medal, but one that would not last.

And, as my daughter say, you don’t always need to take a picture. Enjoy the moment. Remember it as a haiku and make it last.

Speaking of children. I was telling my son that one should write every day. Not only that but put it out for there where the world can take pot shots at it. Practice and feedback, it is how we get better. Contact, resistance, and repetition.

Practice and feedback
One gets better and better,
— a flint getting sharp.

Sake Anyone?

New Year’s Eve,
from dusk til dawn,
Sake anyone?
— Bashō no yōna, 2025

Eat drink and be merry, but there is hell to pay for a little buzz.

Like floating flowers
My sake is white,
My rice is black
花にうき世我が酒白く飯黒し
hana ni ukiyo waga sake shiroku meshi kuroshi
.
Cherry blossoms falling
Sneaking sips of sake
Behind a fan
扇にて酒くむ陰や散る桜
ōgi nite sake kumu kage ya chiru sakura
.
After drinking the sake
The bottle becomes
A flower vase
呑明て花生となる二升樽
nomi akete hana-ike ni sen nishoodaru
.
May swallows dance
but let not mud drop
in my sake cup
盃に泥な落しそ舞ふ燕
盃に泥な落しそ 村ツバメ
sakazuki ni doro na otoshi so muratsubame
.
when I drink sake
no longer can I sleep
this snowy night
酒飲めばいとど寝られぬ夜の雪
sake nomeba itodo nerarenu yoru no yuki
— Matsuo Basho, sake haiku

I confess to liking the last haiku the best. Or maybe it is just that it resonates with me.

The more we drink, the less we sleep
nomeba itodo nerarenu

sake, the more one drinks, the less one sleeps

At the Gym

Late in December at the gym, jogging around the track, trying to remember that one I was young.

I have outlived Matsuo Basho now for quite a few years. Eating well, lifting weights, writing poetry is my secret to success.

One is lifting weights

Grunting, barely holding on

Sadly, getting older

.

Those who are younger

Daily are getting stronger

And looking better

.

The weight of the world

Grows and grows all the time

Troubling one’s mind

.

Like Sisyphus one keeps at it. Like Basho one wanders from time to time.

Snow upon snow

It is said to have been written in the first year of the Jokyo Era (貞享), 1684. A compilation of poems including Basho’s had been published called Shriveled Chestnuts. And Basho was on the road on the Five Highways on the first of his four major wanderings.

Snow upon snow
Tonight, the last month is December
Is there a full moon or not?

雪と雪 . 今宵師走の . 名月か
Yuki to yuki . Koyoi shiwasu no . Meigetsu ya
— Matsuo Basho

Version Two, when there is a glimmer of hope.

Snow upon snow
Tonight, the last month
Is there a sliver of a moon or not?

The Moon 月

It has been said that this haiku was written to settle a disagreement between two individuals (snow upon snow), each part frozen and unwilling to compromise. The moon was supposed to mediate the differences, but the cloudy weather and the snow got in the way. Tsuki is any moon. Meigtsu, refers to a full moon. A sliver of a moon (mikazuki) seems appropriate if we are trying to patch up differences.

雪と雪 . 今宵師走の . 名月か
Yuki to yuki . Koyoi shiwasu no . Meigetsu ya
image, Wikipedia

Frogs in November

frog in a lily pond

In summer, Matsuo Basho’s frog is plopping in a pond, making all sorts of noise. Does the water speak? Let’s imagine Matsuo Basho’s frog in November when the pond is quiet.

Falling leaves drift down—
the old pond’s quiet and calm
the frog is sleeping
— Bashō no yōna, November 2025

Frogs overwinter underwater, buried in mud or resting on the pond bottom, if needed freezing their bodies solid.

The Dao – Chapter One

man on a rock looking at the distant mountains

Matsuo Bashō, the 17th-century Japanese haiku poet, didn’t directly write about Daoism. But he did dabble in Buddhism. And he traveled, one imagines, searching for the Way. He died, on November 28, 1694, on the way to the Grand Shrine in Ise, but got no further than Osaka. He was only 50.

Way beyond words, go —
All things arise from one source,
Travel and behold.
— The Dao, as One

Hail

Lake Biwa at night
plucking the shamisen
the pounding hail
— Matsuo Basho, Fall, 1684

Lake Biwa / at night, the three string shamisen / sounding (like) the sound of hail
琵琶湖の / 夜や三味線の / 音あられ
Biwakō no / yo ya shamisen no / oto arare

Did he like it?

In the first year of the Jōkyō (1684), on the journey of Nozarashi Kiko, in Ogaki, near the waters of Lake Biwa, at a gathering at Nyogyō’s house, Nyogyō was invited to play a Japanese shamisen. (Background Source: Yamanashi-ken)

(Shamisen 三味線, a three string instrument that sounds something like a banjo.)

琵琶湖の / 夜や三味線の / 音あられ
Biwakō no / yo ya shamisen no / oto arare

Gardening

zinnias

On Gardening

Haiku’d. A weed is often a flower out of place. A blossom is only pretty until it fades. Nature makes its own choices, and so do I.

I love to garden
But I hate to make
— Sophie’s choice
Bashō no yōna, Late Summer 2025

Haiku’d, messing with Matsuo Basho’s form (5-7-5), making up the rules. How Dao…

Some random thoughts on gardening.

If it’s true that April is the cruelest month (The Wasteland, T.S. Eliot, 1922), then August is the hottest month when gardeners struggle to water. And throughout the season the gardener knows some seeds grow, some plants thrive, some need a little help.

So do I.