spring greening a poem unlimited
--John Pappas (Boston, Massachusetts)

* * *

battling
the cruelest April
snowdrops
--C. Jean Downer (White Rock, British Columbia)

* * *

fresh herbs
I make sauce vierge
for the very first time
--Keith Evetts (Thames Ditton, U.K.)

* * *

Mouths powdered
with green soybean flour...
uguisu-mochi
--Yutaka Kitajima (Joetsu, Niigata)

* * *

our school playground
after many years the grass
is bright green again
--Urszula Marciniak (Lodz, Poland)

* * *

day therapy ward
the first green leaf
behind the window
--Marek Printer (Kielce, Poland)

* * *

After summer rain
in your deep green eyes
light in a rainforest
--Florian Munteanu (Bucharest, Romania)

* * *

in my heart, this seed,
buried to keep it from harm,
starts to sprout again
--Alan Maley (Canterbury, England)

* * *

ancient villages
whisper…
the grass between the stones
--Giuliana Ravaglia (Bologna, Italy)

* * *

the coastal karst
all the shades of green
in a single gaze
--Mihovila Ceperic-Biljan (Rijeka, Croatia)

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

on the grass
petals of star magnolia
old man’s garden
--Luciana Moretto (Treviso, Italy)

The haikuist’s neighbor is nearing his 100th birthday. Rita Rosen composed the next haiku during a daily walk along the Rhine River. The talented poet lives in Wiesbaden, Germany.

vine tendril
covered with ice crystals
lurking sun

John Hawkhead felt a chill pass through his heart in Bradford on Avon, U.K. Patricia Hawkhead felt the glare from a solar eclipse that crossed North America last week.

partial eclipse
a gradual chill
in our kiss

* * *

his stare
fixing time in place
total eclipse

David Greenwood penned this poem to commemorate the Japan’s prime minister’s visit to the White House in Washington, D.C.

with so few words
boundaries and barriers
dissipate

Christopher Hanlon likely cheered the ice breakup on Wabamun Lake near Moonlight Bay in Edmonton, Alberta. Lori Kiefer welcomed migrants back to London, England.

ice-free bay
soft honk of first geese
at far shore

* * *

across the lake
the sweeping echo
of returning geese

Strolling in Bihac, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Refika Dedic seemed to have missed the merriment that young lovers enjoy while viewing cherry blossoms in parks. Evetts cycled past a radiant couple in a park.

between whispers
waves of greenery
lonely date

* * *

lovers
on a park bench
green acorns

Hotter weather is already pushing spring out of the way and it is forcing plants, as well as haikuists, to adapt to climate change. Despite the earlier appearance of sprouting leaves, Downer was tempted to procrastinate. Anne-Marie McHarg discovered a cat’s hiding place in London, England. The Japanese season word (kigo) “aoba no hana” refers to lingering cherry blossoms among leafy green leaves.

frondescent trees--
I curl back up
in bed

* * *

Among the greenery
The sleepy faces
Of cats

Haikuists are hoping that the Japanese government will soon register haiku as a national intangible cultural asset and urge UNESCO to recognize haiku practice as an intangible cultural treasure in need of conservation around the world. Murasaki Sagano leafed through the first few pages of a book.

Pressed petals
falling on page 4
spring departs

Forsaken at a tender age in Columbo, Sri Lanka, Ashoka Weerakkody alluded to Edward Fitzgerald’s 1859 translation of the “Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam” that contains this quatrain:
Alas, that Spring should vanish with the Rose! The sweet-scented book of Youth shall close!

Nightingale hides
its scented book of songs--
Spring leaves

Kyle Sullivan visited an urban renewal project at Dajia Riverside Park in Kaohsiung, Taiwan.

an earth like our own…
summer grasses grow
at the spaceport site

Govind Joshi empathized with a hardworking gardener in Dehradun, India.

pedaling to work
a machine on his shoulder
the grasscutter

Nancy Brady trimmed her lawn in Huron, Ohio.

spring afternoon
the first haircut
of the greening grass

Richard Bailly arranged square pieces of turf on the ground in Fargo, North Dakota.

sod
green side up
sad

Biswajit Mishra welcomed rain in Calgary, Alberta.

leaf to leaf
a raindrop
growing roots

Those “green leaves would have stung,” cautioned Marshall Hryciuk in Toronto, Ontario.

never quite landing
on a trellis of nettles
April red admiral

Ian Willey said he “got a bit of good news” about his broken ankle from his doctor in Takamatsu, Kagawa Prefecture.

blossoms in the breeze
the doctor says it’s okay
to put weight on it

T.D. Ginting hopes to go trekking soon in Medan, North Sumatra. Justice Joseph Prah lurched down the Aburi mountains near Accra, Ghana. David Cox walked through redwood trees planted over 100 years ago in Rotorua, New Zealand.

looking at a backpack
longing
for (sc)rambling

* * *

on old road
down wild mountain
spring

* * *

the sequoias
on the memorial walk
have seen it all

Hryciuk composed this haiku while hiking.

waterfalling clouds
ravens cawing
as i crest the hill

Tomislav Maretic climbed Sljeme mountain in Zagreb, Croatia.

reading my book--
green climbs to the top
of the mountain

Eric Kimura hiked the hills above Aiea, Hawaii, but was “pummeled by winds as we crossed over the tops of ridge lines. The wind roared past our ears and wildly waved tree branches. It sounded a lot like the monster sea waves.” Note the punctuation at the end of his haiku, which leaves readers to solve the riddle.

Chill wintry gusts
Crashing into ridge top trees
Sound of breakers?

Note how Yosa Buson (1716-1784) ended this hokku: 0chikochi no taki no oto kiku wakaba kana

Here and there--
hearing the sound of waterfalls
young leaves, I wonder

Ravaglia composed this haiku while listening to her heart.

distant winter--
towards overflowing valley
the music of water

After losing her godmother, planting flowers and trimming apple trees this spring had a bittersweet taste for Steliana Cristina Voicu in Ploiesti, Romania. The gifted haikuist said that she often “felt her presence in the garden.”

long recovery…
feeling again the aroma
of fresh cut grass

Maria Tosti wondered how to let bygones be bygones in San Sisto, Italy.

along the urban trail
plum blossoms--how to forget
sweetly the sad days

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Give your brain a boost by deciphering haiku at http://www.asahi.com/ajw/special/haiku/. The next issues of the Asahi Haikuist Network appear on May 3, 17 and 31. Readers are invited to send haiku inspired by Yosa Buson’s (1716-1783) hokku: Here and there--hearing the sound of waterfalls young leaves, I wonder (0chikochi no taki no oto kiku wakaba kana). Send haiku 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).