winter sunrise a squadron of flamingos fly past the moon
--Francoise Maurice (Draguignan, France)

* * *

peek-a-boo moon
the child in me
awakes
--Tony Williams (Glasgow, Scotland)

* * *

stubble moon
at the edge of winter
a touch of frost
--Marion Clarke (Warrenpoint, Northern Ireland)

* * *

children’s misery…
the soft light
of the moon
--Helga Stania (Ettiswil, Switzerland)

* * *

the wolf moon--
barking of the neighbour’s dogs
calling...
--Julia Guzman (Cordoba, Argentina)

* * *

onset of winter
a wolf’s howl merging
with the wind
--John J. Han (Manchester, Missouri)

* * *

in the shade of the cedars--
a pack of wolves
howl at the moon
--Giuliana Ravaglia (Bologna, Italy)

* * *

icicles
some trunks blending in
more easily
--Jerome Berglund (Minneapolis, Minnesota)

* * *

windless night
the way of the moon
seaside hotel
--Doc Sunday (Hiroshima)

* * *

freshly fallen
moonlight through the trees
owl calls echo
--Steve Schultz (Georgetown, Texas)

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

winter night sky
the overturned ocean
frozen starfishes
--Tejendra Sherchan (Kathmandu, Nepal)

The haikuist upended the heavens. Maya Daneva headed home before a winter storm reached The Hague, Netherlands.

short day
the shore calls my fishing boat
first snowflakes

In this column, haikuists wax elegantly in tonight’s full moon. Joshua St. Claire turned on artificial lights.

half-remembered song
the scent of honeysuckle
under the mercury vapor moon

Chen-ou Liu exhaled in Ajax, Ontario. Pitt Buerken undressed in Munster, Germany.

my breath
curling through my wife’s
first frost

* * *

first night frost
the walnut tree sheds
its leaves

Valincia Richard studies haiku at Mississippi Valley State University under the tutelage of her professor, John Zheng.

moonlight
we forget
who leaned first

In Tokyo, Murasaki Sagano cooled her burning heart in moonshine.

The cold night
grated ginger in miso soup
my heart burns

* * *

moonlight poured
stories into his tumbler
cut crystal glass

Slavica Mileva poured a drink called loneliness in Skopje, North Macedonia.

Fog thickens--
in the empty home
tea with rum

Sipping Japanese rice wine in San Diego, California, Richard L. Matta cheered the arrival of a colorful male waterbird: perhaps it paired with a little brown hen swimming on a winter pond with a nest in a nearby tree.

sake sharing--
the mandarin duck
makes a landing

The master poet Yosa Buson penned this line in 1751: Oshidori ni bi o tsukushite ya fuyu kodachi

The mandarin ducks
they’ve exhausted all beauty--
winter trees stand stark

On visit to a park in Kanazawa, Ishikawa Prefecture, Julie Ann Lebitania from Sorsogon, Philippines, saw an example of the winter season word “yukitsuri.”

trees at Kenrokuen
supported by ropes
the touch of first snow

Masumi Orihara was saddened that “as it gets colder, there are fewer children playing in the park.”

gradual decay
ginkgo nuts on a swing
wintry park

Refika Dedic’s mother leaves a small bowl of salt by her kitchen window and a saltlick by a tree for animals wintering near Bihac, Bosnia and Herzegovina.

winter night
salt left
in the forest

Fred Blakey shivered in shadows. Facing a winter squall, Joanna Ashwell flung her arms upward in desperation.

alone in dark bars
deep in the city naked
an icicle tree

* * *

advancing closer
every oak and elm
akimbo in the storm

In Rawalpindi, Pakistan, Hifsa Ashraf shuddered. Compare her three lines below to these penned in 1923 by D.H. Lawrence: Never swallows! Bats! The swallows are gone.

dead of night--
bats emerging
from the moon

Teiichi Suzuki shone brightly last night in Osaka.

The full moon
though it’s a perfect circle
someday will wane

At twilight in California, Monica Kakkar spotted the planet nicknamed the Evening Star.

Half Moon Bay...
opening the night
Venus in winter

Ravaglia sketched a silhouette. In Lazarevac, Serbia, Dejan Ivanovic sketched in monochrome. Philmore Place regrets having left Minsk, Belarus.

cut flowers--
in the shadow of the room
ribbons of the moon

* * *

first snowflakes
a black hand strews seeds
upon the earth

* * *

abandoned garden
don’t let me go again
ghosts from the past

Mahfouz conjured a ghost in Paris, France.

Full moon mountain hare
Snow coat heathland camouflage
Devours fogbow, wights

Ravaglia sensed the touch of a ghostly wind. Arvinder Kaur wondered if soldiers would soon return home. Archie G. Carlos was caught between a rock and a hard place in St. Louis Park, Minnesota.

empty chair--
as the moon rises
it swings

* * *

moonlight
rising from the trenches
end of war

* * *

dad’s firm stand
about a nursing home
hard frost

Angela Giordano penned this line as she walked by a cold home in Avigliano, Italy.

An old man locked in his house out of fear of the unknown

Christina Chin weathered through “a hair-raising experience” at a friend’s house in Kuching, Borneo.

the soothsayer reads
her card and sprinkles
salt and black pepper

* * *

throwing salt
around the house
she rids of the spirits

Charlotte Bird whispered a prayer in Phoenix, Arizona.

the floorboards strewn
with salt prayers--
dark November

Zoe Mahfouz reported on why old weather lingers in Paris, France.

Winter storm clusters
Forecasters gone with the wind
Polar vortex eye

Remarking that it was “the first snowfall in Nagoya in a long time,” Satoru Kanematsu enjoyed inspecting this line of troops in the snowball corps.

“Good morning” parade of snowmen made by kids

As a wintertime game in Oroslavje, Croatia, Gordana Vlasic recalled exhaling white vapor.

smell of smoke
the boy shows off
in front of his friends

A.J. Johnson cleared snow and ice from out front a home in Stephens City, Virginia.

cold wind
leaf prints fade
on the sidewalk

Marilyn Humbert was suddenly dusted by snow in Sydney, Australia.

possum paws slip
crossing a frosty roof
first winter night

Jennifer Gurney began her morning where it left off last evening in Broomfield, Colorado.

the day unfolds
cold and crisp, a sheet left
overnight on the line

Dorna Hainds wore this white dress just once, before folding it away in Lapeer, Michigan. Richard L. Matta squeezed in another hanger in San Diego, California. Williams’s family insulated the entrance way to their home. Pamela A. Babusci got ready to color winter in Rochester, New York. Govind Joshi washed woolens in Dehradun, India.

folded snowflake--
in the back of the closet,
a wedding dress yellowing

* * *

edge of winter
the thickening
of the coat rack

* * *

second frost--
our thicker coats
move up a peg

* * *

end of autumn
sorting my winter berets
into colors

* * *

handwashing pullover
the heaviness
of winter

Writing from Seattle, Washington, Horst Ludwig felt as though he had entered the winter of life. In Paris, France, Emil Karla felt life slip away through his hands.

Is age a season?
One of my questions no more
not still wide open

* * *

fallen hair
the bathtub white
of a winter morn

Tim Dwyer reflected on his years in Bangor, Northern Ireland.

rising moon
almost touchable…
how I have lived

Sagano compared sepia photos taken at the end of World War II and several years later.

Parents photo
from an album
put aside

* * *

Soldier’s uniform
changed into business suits
father’s photos

* * *

On father’s coffin
hand-woven silk kimono
loved wearing at home

Cornelia Rossberg reached up in Coburg, Germany.

Top shelf row
in the shop window
winter boots

Ram Chandran can’t be cured of what ails him in Madurai, India. Stania knows what to drink when it snows on the Swiss mountains. Buttoning up his overcoat, David Cox recalled his warm holidays in Palermo, Italy.

winter solitude--
a never ending
love sickness

* * *

Italian coffee
and Swiss chocolates--
snow falls

* * *

holiday flat--
saying my goodbyes to
the coffee machine

Slawa Sibiga turned to the December page of a tradwife calendar in Tychy, Poland. Chen-ou Liu noticed the lost and found in Ajax, Ontario.

first snow
the poster girl
in a red bikini

* * *

a red bikini
pinned to the noticeboard...
sunlit waves lapping

Opening her curtains in Iasi, Romania, Mirela Brailean was pleasantly surprised. Simona Brinzaru was surprised by a Christmas cactus in Transylvania, Romania.

the first snowflakes
a rose blooms behind the curtain
unknowingly

* * *

unexpected flower
on the desert ground
hope--still there

Yutaka Kitajima welcomed “a newcomer to our region in Joetsu, Niigata. Its natural habitat has moved northward due to global warming.”

Tonight too
gray-bellied gecko
on the pane

Morgan Ophir is eager to play outdoors in Sydney, Australia. Marek Printer rekindled the spark of pure, uncontainable joy in Kielce, Poland.

first snowfall
two kitten noses pressed
against the window

* * *

first snow...
the kindergarten window
filled with nose prints

Tsanka Shishkova watched the day begin from behind a soundproof window in Sofia, Bulgaria.　 In St. Andrews, Scotland, David Greenwood was startled when an animal returned his stare.

in the morning silence
sound of frozen branches
leaping squirrels

* * *

autumn alders
the dancing squirrel checks
that I’m still watching

Melissa Dennison watched a startling replay. Philip Davison drove through river mist in Dublin, Ireland.

Amur tiger
sizes up the camera trap
in the snow

* * *

astray on the road
cataract headlamps lighting
the nightjar’s domain

Forsaking his hometown, James Penha resolved, “I never want to experience another New York winter.” Sipping a hot “kava” while listening to robins sing in her garden, Mihovila Ceperic-Biljan recommended wintering in Rijeka, Croatia.

Bali heatwave
perspires and inspires
dreams of winter

* * *

climate change
coffee on the balcony--
first day of winter

Artur Zielinski lost sight of the trail he was following in Gdynia, Poland. Leon Tefft has lost contact with old friends in Greenville, South Carolina.

Morning frost dusts
the cranberry red--
the track disappears

* * *

cold moon
crossing names off
the Christmas list

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

The year-end issue of the Asahi Haikuist Network will appear Dec. 19. Readers are invited to compose a haiku about a swansong and send it by postcard to David McMurray at the International University of Kagoshima, Sakanoue 8-34-1, Kagoshima, 891-0197, Japan, or by 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).