When I stroke behind her ears
as she settles to sleep,
I love even more than her purr
the ecstatic curl and flex
of one little paw.
*
Sunday breakfast treat —
café style raisin toast
two fat slices
*
I draw Queen of Swords
the independent woman
also the widow –
happy to think of Andrew
and what a good life we made
summer interrupted
rain all night
today all drizzle –
even my garden statue
looks miserable
*
My card for today
is Queen of Cups.
Does it signify me
(water sign woman)
or the damp day outside?
*
The library reminds me
those books are coming due.
OK – this afternoon
turns into a banquet:
gorging poetry.
*
The small cat dreams
through the afternoon,
making tiny throat sounds
as if calling, or perhaps
greeting someone (me?)
Clover
and dandelions
dance
on my front lawn –
but no bees hum
************
cutting the grass
beheading clover
and dandelions –
leaving in their space
no shelter for snakes
Prompts from the Tanka Poets on Site facebook group
... is the name of an art exhibition currently showing locally at the Small Works Gallery. Five local poets, including me, were invited to submit poems which might inspire 11 local artists. I sent them haiku, for the directness and immediacy of the visual images. Three artists chose six – or five – of them. (In the transcribing, sending poems over the internet, two haiku managed to run together as one poem. And hey, it really worked! An artist responded to it as a whole.)
You may well have read the haiku before. I hunted out ones I'd already written, which have been posted on my blogs. But here they are accompanied by the art works they inspired, and the artists' comments.
(All images are copyright and should not be used without written permission from the copyright owners. Contact me for details.)
after 10 years
our one frangipani
covers the wall
Photo by Sarah Temporal.
Elaine said:
This poem spoke to me of the wonder of nature, always surprising us, and of Australian summers resplendent with neighbourhood frangipani trees of all varieties. I had my own amazing experience with my own frangipani tree this year, which truly came into its own and suddenly appeared fully grown as if from nowhere.
My work references abstract expressionism and minimalism and speaks to intense transcendent experiences inspired in nature. Experiences which remind us of our place in the world and help us to connect to that still place within and the interconnectedness of all things. These works reflect my inner landscape and search for peace and harmony in an embattled world.
~~~~~~~~~~~~
Oh!
the bougainvillea –
purple splash
Spring breeze –
a dead leaf dangles
from a web
darkness gathers
the old mountains
stand their ground
Annique Goldenberg said:
I have approached this call and response exhibition as a form of poetic assemblage, an ode to memory and evolution. When reading the poems [by which she means everyone's] I found myself drawn to the shorter passages, a line here and there, a haiku, or a senryu. These moments evoked in me images, colours, shapes, and stories which I could then use as a way to initiate a visual realisation. Drawing on my archive of unfinished works, unused papers, and found objects, gathered over the last eleven years, I felt a renewed delight upon discovering sketches, test pieces and fragments of works that had never been given a chance to shine.
A pattern emerged of a layered assemblage approach, forming in response to each poem's impression. I am conscious of how our lives, worlds and times are intimately interconnected, and so enjoyed discovering how the ideas I was drawn to in the poems inspired new meanings and relationships in my material expressions.
~~~~~~~~~~~~
Autumn dusk
blue hills darken sharp-edged
against pale sky
darkness gathers
the old mountains
stand their ground
Shelley Anfield said:
I feel a deep connection to nature and am fascinated by the dichotomy of fragility and strength that exists within all life and the corresponding constant striving for balance. For me, the landscape is a perfect metaphor for the complexities of human life. There is chaos and order, and within that a perfection that is difficult to comprehend. I approach my work as a form of meditation and hope to inspire a moment of stillness and contemplation within the viewer.
Rosemary Nissen-Wade's haiku incorporating imagery of the mountains and sky inspired me and a response felt inevitable. I generally have a preference for painting large immersive pieces, so the haiku with its brevity seemed to suit the small scale of paintings I chose to create for this exhibition.
... Also, as Rosemary and I are both local artists, I chose to represent Wollumbin, the sacred mountain of our local region, which resides in a World Heritage listed area.
All photos except the first are by Rosemary Nissen-Wade.
~ and one American sentence ~
wakeful playful
morning cat pauses
for a good wash
*********
from her sweet face
long loud yowling —
she wants me NOW
*********
Spring night
my cat wants play
not sleep
*********
So as to settle purring to sleep she insists on my stroking hands.
*********
my cat curls asleep
wrapped in folds of red blanket
as if in a rose
Linked to Friday Writings #6 The shorter the sweeter? at Poets and Storytellers United. (We could share up to 12 micropoems.)
My deaf cat
doesn’t hear the storm.
If she feels the energy
she gives no sign.
She calls me insistently
as she does every night
to come stroke and scratch
behind her ears and under her chin,
then settles on her white rug
and relaxes into sleep.
in heavy rain
a tiny green tree frog
gives huge voice –
his joy my comfort
its deep steady throb
sodden ground
greening as new weeds
split the mulch
*********
rain-soaked Spring –
perhaps this Summer
no bushfires?
