cutting back the lucky bamboo
--Claire Ninham (North Yorkshire, U.K.)

* * *

four leaf clover--
in the snow a lost
pendant
--Ana Drobot (Bucharest, Romania)

* * *

spring field
seeded with bullet cases
clover turns green
--Levko Dovgan (Lviv, Ukraine)

* * *

although she’s gone
I’m sure she’s somewhere dancing
in four-leaf clover
--Ed Bremson (Raleigh, North Carolina)

* * *

longevity...
not luck but genes
grandma snaps
--Madhuri Pillai (Melbourne, Australia)

* * *

Railroad signal lights
flash on the tracks…
change to green
--Kiyoshi Fukuzawa (Tokyo)

* * *

no climbing sign...
green caterpillar rises
above it
--David Cox (Beijing, China)

* * *

green comet
scientists and diviners
in front of telescopes
--Tsanka Shishkova (Sofia, Bulgaria)

* * *

poet’s luck--
the year
of the rabbit
--Tom Sacramona (Watertown, Massachusetts)

* * *

crunching numbers
everyone’s a millionaire
at the lottery booth
--Mike Fainzilber (Rehovot, Israel)

------------------------------
FROM THE NOTEBOOK
------------------------------

blast of wind
a four-leaf clover
hidden in my hair
--Eufemia Griffo (Milan, Italy)

The haikuist’s fortune was blown by mid-March, when the first spring gale (“haru ichiban”) hit Japan. She is familiar with the Ides of March on the Roman calendar: a March 15 deadline for settling debts. Keith Evetts paid his taxes in Thames Ditton, U.K.

tax return
my allowance
for moonlight

J.D. Nelson is celebrating his birthday today, St. Patrick’s Day. He recently launched his first full-length poetry collection, “in ghostly onehead.” Here are a few opening lines from “starting to eat,” my favorite poem in his book.

seeking the blue
this is the blue
that older day

Rosemarie Schuldes revisited a favorite page from her pen pals in Mattsee, Austria. The decorative book of names and addresses was passed on from one person to another, who each added their own details, and was eventually returned to the haikuist.

lucky clover
in the old friendship book
forever green

Junko Saeki wrote a poem about Empress Emerita Michiko, who reportedly searched for four-leaf clovers during her days as the Crown Princess, noting “we are lucky to have had such a romantic and hopeful person in the Imperial House.”

the Empress
looking for four-leaf clovers
springtime

Colleagues of Satoru Kanematsu are bartering books in exchange for his latest haiku book, “Coming Around,” printed by Shoeisha, Nagoya.

Arriving
with a colored leaf
haiku book

C.X. Turner’s haiku propounds the Victorian era of floriography in Birmingham, England.

my heart
a pressed peony
in the pages of your book

Ivan Georgiev read a real tearjerker in Gottingen, Germany.

through tears
drowning the shamrock
in her diary

Rifka Samson made her debut in today’s column by wishing readers a lovely St. Paddy’s Day with this haiku, titled, “Gershwin.”

a horn and clarinet
a pale yellow dress
spring’s caress

Here’s a haiku titled “Things a Green Crayon Could Color” by Jennifer Gurney, who proudly claimed that she is “half Irish” and a newly published poet in Broomfield, Colorado.

Lots of springtime leaves
The middle of a rainbow
A watermelon rind

Charlie Smith had the luck of the Irish on his side in Raleigh, North Carolina. He opened an envelope from the Fulbright Foundation containing a letter announcing he had received an award to study in Osaka. Arvinder Kaur hoped she would find success in Chandigarh, India.

girl’s day
first Fulbright award
tears of joy

* * *

first examination
mother’s blessing
in sweetened curd

Bremson dearly misses his aunt, who shared her uncanny ability with him to find lucky charms.

after passing
she now roams endless fields
of four-leaf clover

Horst Ludwig shared a haiku about sainthoods and nature in Ireland.

Island of beauty,
all snakes gone. -- But the devil
stays in the detail

Reading a holy book in Marsa, Malta, Francis Attard recommended a biblical poem about the joys of married life.

Song of Solomon
gold-tooled parchment
love in margins

Shelli Jankowski-Smith subtly imbued this haiku with images of the verbs “to press” and “to love” in Swampscott, Massachusetts.

warming by the stove
our two old pairs of gloves still
mated together

Sandra St-Laurent shared a good story in Whitehorse, Yukon. Sweeney reached the end of his book.

takeoff position
we lean together
one book

* * *

deep snow
the crow has turned out to be
the hero of the story

Hifsa Ashraf relied on the wind in Rawalpindi, Pakistan.

counting on
the spring breeze
first date

Ramona Linke was rewarded after a storm passed by Saxony-Anhalt, Germany.

after the storm
the morning light sparkles
on bamboo leaves

Lafcadio blended this poem in Chattanooga, Tennessee.

green with envy
the chameleon
blends in

Wai Mei Wong colored in Toronto, Ontario.

St. Patrick’s Day
all of her green crayons grow
stubby

Govind Joshi ate healthily in Dehradun, India.

breakfast greens
a petal of mustard flower
collected with the leaves

Angela Giordano asked a question before reshuffling her life in Avigliano, Italy: my fortune--hidden among the tarot cards.

Kimberly A. Horning asked a ghost to reply to a question by moving her fingertips on a heart-shaped piece of wood in St. Augustine, Florida.

under
the ouija board
a black cat

Mircea Moldovan paused for a moment in Jibou, Romania. Tomislav Maretic was inspired by a musical organ powered by sea waves in Zadar, Croatia.

covered cart
a gypsy woman with a pearl earring
winks at me

* * *

a whale sings
his love song to the female
a thousand miles away

Terrie Jacks swooned in Ballwin, Missouri. John Zheng wondered why there was so much busy birdsong in Itta Bena, Mississippi.

shamrocks in bloom
the Irish in me croons
Danny Boy

* * *

incessant chirrup
for mating or
for being alone?

Patrick Sweeney’s pot won’t whistle anymore.

the ruined embouchure
of the dented
tea kettle

Archie Carlos felt down on his luck while out for a walk in St. Louis Park, Minnesota.

homeless man
a coffee cup filled
with snow

Every March 17, Amy Losak writes a poem in the streets and “answers to the surname, McLosak!” Carl Brennan enjoyed the colorful St. Patrick’s Day parade in multicultural New York.

the blue of the sky
outmatched by the green
Fifth Ave. parade

* * *

St. Patrick’s Day march
through the deathly snowfall
Persian ney music

Pippa Phillips swam in a pool in St. Louis, Missouri. Mario Massimo Zontini bid a fond adieu to the metallic green-headed ducks that wintered in Parma, Italy.

blue hour
watching the lights come on
underwater

* * *

winter departs--
on the mallard’s feathers
lingers the cold

Cox’s senses were startled by bright colors, a biting wind, breaking ice, taste of rime, and the smell of rotting fish.

blue mirror
bright stink of phosphorous
on the river ice

Brennan tippled a little inspiration. Fainzilber is standing pat.

Banshees fall silent
Leprechauns belittle me
Japanese whiskey

* * *

a lively debate
wine or whisky
we sip green tea

Kanematsu composed a death poem for a much-lamented stray cetacean as its huge corpse was towed from the Yodogawa river to Osaka Bay.

Burying
deep in the ocean
the sperm whale

Francoise Maurice spotted a lucky sign of spring in Draguignan, France. Zontini rejoiced.

in the biting cold
the slender figure
of a deer

* * *

spring is here--
the plum blossoms overshadow
the leaves’ shy green

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The next regular issue of the Asahi Haikuist Network appears March 31. Readers are invited to send haiku related to money on a postcard to David McMurray at the International University of Kagoshima, Sakanoue 8-34-1, Kagoshima, 891-0197, Japan, or e-mail to (mcmurray@fka.att.ne.jp).

* * *

David McMurray has been writing the Asahi Haikuist Network column since April 1995, first for the Asahi Evening News. He is on the editorial board of the Red Moon Anthology of English-Language Haiku, columnist for the Haiku International Association, and is editor of Teaching Assistance, a column in The Language Teacher of the Japan Association for Language Teaching (JALT).

McMurray is professor of intercultural studies at The International University of Kagoshima where he lectures on international haiku. At the Graduate School he supervises students who research haiku. He is a correspondent school teacher of Haiku in English for the Asahi Culture Center in Tokyo.

McMurray judges haiku contests organized by The International University of Kagoshima, Ito En Oi Ocha, Asahi Culture Center, Matsuyama City, Polish Haiku Association, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Seinan Jo Gakuin University, and Only One Tree.

McMurray’s award-winning books include: “Teaching and Learning Haiku in English” (2022); “Only One Tree Haiku, Music & Metaphor” (2015); “Canada Project Collected Essays & Poems” Vols. 1-8 (2013); and “Haiku in English as a Japanese Language” (2003).