Describing the Day in Haikus

Local Gems is neither local, nor is it about gems, not the jewelry kind at least. It is a poetry website that sets poetry challenges. A week at a time, sometimes writing fifteen poems over the week, or in this opening week of August, writing seven haikus a day. For those of you in the know, a haiku is a Japanese poem of seventeen syllables, in three lines of five, seven, and five, traditionally evoking images of the natural world. There are variations. More lines sometimes, more syllables sometimes and perhaps a focus on people rather than nature.

Seventeen syllables. How hard can that be? But seven of them each day? If I was doing this properly, I would be paying to enroll. For a fee I would be getting power-points and prompts popping up daily in emails. I have done other challenges with them. For an additional expense I could get my poems printed in a chapbook. There’s nothing to stop me treating myself, but I should know enough about writing haikus not to need the help. As for the prompts – I have daily life all around me. I’d like to say that it is brimming with inspiration, but it is not.

Haiku 1

may the day be filled

with all that God would give – His

unmeasured blessing

I got the day wrong. I thought I was meeting up with friends to celebrate a birthday. I queued for ten minutes outside the café we were meeting at. I thought one of them would be inside waiting. She is a get-to-places-early kind of person. She wasn’t there. I thought I missed a message about missed or cancelled busses, but no, I had got the wrong date. It is tomorrow. I have to do it all again tomorrow – the early rise, the swift breakfast, the bus into town and everything.

The café is the best in town for cakes, hence the queues. However, I am sworn off sweet things for the foreseeable future. A recent diabetic eye scan revealed little things, hints, of too much sugar in the bloodstream. Not anything that requires treatment, said the man behind the scanners, but a drop in sugar levels should help. I am possibly into two weeks of almost behaving.

Haiku 2

the counter-top cakes

smile and say, 'Eat me!'. I say,

' Get thee behind me.'

A friend has amended the last line to ‘Get thee inside me.’ It has the right number of syllables but not the right kind of mindset I wish to foster.

Haiku 3

Cool dude, nephew’s pose

‘Short back and sides, sir? ‘Yes, please.’

Growing up fast – (sigh)

A haiku prompted by a picture posted on Facebook. I am trying to remember whether this is a nephew I have met. I must have. Living so far from the clan I don’t get to see all the milestones of them growing up. It seems as if I live at the edge of the world and visits are few. I am happy with that at the moment as there are so many bits of the house in need of attention.

Haiku 4

chiggy pig, cheeselog

woodlouse on my patio

I will evict thee

It’s a rare dry day. There’s a brown bin to fill and it is not a last-minute dash. There’s a patio to clear and a table and chairs to wash down. So much rain over the last few weeks and every weed is looking lush. As quick as I am to pull them up another weed appears. I am reluctant to spray pesticides, or even pour salt into the cracks of the patio. I don’t want to poison the birds by poisoning the bugs, although I might change my mind if the gang of crows doesn’t leave my bird feeder alone. I am not at home with bugs and I think the woodlice have worked it out. When it comes to running away – it’s not them that does the running. I love the names from different parts of the UK. Maybe I would like them better if I called them chiggy pigs. The louse bit of woodlouse makes me feel itchy all over. In my younger days I had, as most kids do, lice. It was an unpleasant experience, head over the sink and a louse comb dragged along the scalp. Oh no! I am going into itchy mode just thinking about it.

Haiku 5

She counts her stitches

Marks her rows, knit one, purl one and

Weaves a place of peace

I like this one. An Amazon delivery has just popped through the letterbox. Stitch markers. I have been wrangling with a pattern that isn’t that complicated. It’s nothing that I haven’t done before. It is the amount of stitches, one hundred and fifty three that upends me. It requires a span of concentration I don’t possess. Is this a knit two together? Is it a yarn forward? A friend suggested using stitch markers at the end of every pattern block. In the absence of stitch markers I was using safety pins but now I don’t need to.

Knitting is good for mental health, although that probably depends on the pattern, the wool, the needles and the expertise of the knitter. Taking it back to the beginning over and over is not good for mental health. Since using stitch markers, or safety pins, I have now reached row twenty of fifty four. Not quite half way but getting there.

Two more haikus to go. Are you still with me? I am not sure I am still with me.

Haiku 6

It’s not Jack this time

Who bravely climbs the bean stalk

Just bugs eating leaves

I have promised myself that I will catch the little buggers one night. Next door has a better menu of growing things. Next door also has nets covering what is growing. I have sent out a Whatsapp message to my pot people. That sounds not quite how I meant it to sound. They are not growing illegal stuff and imbibing it rolled in paper. This is the Pot Gang who send me pots, coconut compost, seeds and instructions every month. Beans, spinach and spring onions are all growing nicely, but the bean leaves are being plundered. I have soil of my own but to get to it requires weeding. A pot is manageable. More recent pots have lettuce, carrots and parsley in them. There’s not much happening. A watched veggie pot, like the kettle that doesn’t boil, doesn’t grow!

Last haiku.

Haiku 7

‘Goodnight,’ says the sun

leaving behind long shadows

stars wait in the wings

And the challenge starts all over again tomorrow!