Corning Glass Haiga

                    

                                         



                                     

Haigaonline Featured Artist

Haiku

tulips aplenty

more than I hoped

more than I planted

soft dampness
the silken feel of spring 
on my arms

a gentle breeze

tickling my senses

first peonies

Kukai

Chrysanthemum

Cattails

Haibun

ESTEPA, SPAIN

A quiet drive from Granada to Seville.  We reach Estepa, a village existing in defiance of gravity, as if by sheer stubbornness.

                                                                             the brown hills—

                                 white stucco houses anchored

                                 with olive trees

A dazzling light bounces off the white surfaces. No cantina or café visible. Hot cobblestones and cool gardens behind stone walls with iron gates and tinkling fountains. Geraniums as big as bushes, oleander bushes as big as trees. Food smells from an alley, the clink of cutlery and the murmur of muffled voices, but empty streets.  Not even a dog or a cat.

                                   siesta

                                   our footsteps seeming louder

                                   the further we walk

A sign:  Mercado. A peek through the open door. Dark and cooler inside.  More like someone's home than a market.  A few chunks of hard dry goat cheese on a counter, bottles of water as warm as the air.

                                                                                  the hot shade—

                                     eating bread and oranges

                                     and red dust 

Bottle Rockets

Haibun

REFLECTIONS ON A VILLAGE IN ITALY   

The village is old, similar to the birthplace of my ancestors, one like many others that form my ethnic and cultural past.

rugged hills

shadow the stone houses—

tripping on cobbles

The family name is not here in this village, but that is not important.  The faces are the same.  My father's mother, frail, dressed in black, with white hair pulled tightly into a bun, is here.

searching for family—

the stooped old woman

with a distant smile

My mother's father, sturdy, full-chested, with a bushy mustache and sunburned skin on his bald head is here.  I see him again as a young man with curly black hair and strong muscles unloading barrels from a truck.  Other young men with their laughing mouths and casual swagger 

standing on the corners and in the coffee bars are my uncles and cousins.  The black-eyed women pushing fat olive skinned babies, the small boys in their short pants and dirty faces, the skinny girls with their faded dresses. All are my mothers and fathers, now young again.

                                                        a boy with big ears

skidding around a corner

a vespa spews fumes      

The images raise a few hackles on the back of my neck.  It is as if I have come home.

Stylus Poetry Journal