The Family of MahMight – more haiku and nominations!

 

A Group MahMight Production!

oh lingering moon

be there... I have

some more dreams

Ram Chandran

About my haiku:

The moon gives rise to dreams, poetries, love, passion, and it sounds like music in my mind. When I am in the company of the moon, I talk to the moon. One may not believe this, but the moon also talks back to me. On a moonlit night, this ku came to me.

 

Favorite haikai verse:

 

Come, butterfly

It's late–

We've miles to go together.

Matsuo Bashō

unknown translator

 

Why:

I was awestruck when I first read Bashō’s verse. ‘Miles to go’… the word I frequently utter in my mind…Who shall come with me?  Who’ll share my dreams, destination or journey…for my dreams and journey are sweet for me but may be dreaded for another. Someone sharing my dream may have their own path. Bashō finds his companion and invites his companion in his long journey of ‘miles to go’

Well, if a butterfly is to be the companion, no complaints.

Waiting for Godot:

Was I sleeping, while the others suffered? Am I sleeping now? Tomorrow, when I wake, or think I do, what shall I say of today?”

Withnail and I

Hairs are your aerials. They pick up signals from the cosmos, and transmit them directly into you brain! This is the reason bald-headed men are uptight.

Alan note:

okiyo okiyo waga tomo ni se n nuru ko chō

Wake up, wake up, / sleeping butterfly, / and let us be companions! (R.H.Blyth)

Wake up! Wake up! It’s I, / who want you for companion, / sleeping butterfly. 

(Harold G. Henderson) 

Wake, butterfly– / it’s late, we’ve miles / to go together. (Lucien Stryk)

wake up wake up / I want to be your friend / little sleeping butterfly (Jane Reichhold)

Wake up! Wake up! / Then we’ll become good friends, / sleeping butterfly 

(Sam Hamill)

Check out:

On Love and Barley: Haiku of Basho

Lucien Stryk (Translator) 

Penguin Books 1987

https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/350/35095/on-love-and-barley/9780140444599.html 

*** 

Mark Meyer

"I've had Marmite.... tastes very much like what we fed the fruitflies in our lab. It was quite OK, but then I like natto."

what you're saying

suppose I'll never know

face of the moon

Mark Meyer

I became aware that I've been watching the moon for seven decades and still remain as mystified and enchanted as ever. 

Favorite haiku:

alone I watch the moon sink behind the mountain 

         —  Santōka Taneda

Mark said:

“If I had to choose, I'd say Santōka must be my favorite haiku poet. When I first encountered his poems, I was transfixed. Simplicity, awareness, imagery, his humble acceptance.... on and on. Appropriately, here's one of his moon poems I particularly like.”

It's been ages since I read (& saw) Waiting for Godot. I pick this quote, because it stuck with me:  

“Nothing happens. Nobody comes, nobody goes. It's awful.” 

.... and ages since I watched Withnail and I, but this seems apt:  "I feel like a pig shat in my head." 

Alan notes: 

Nattō (納豆) 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nattō

“Natto are one of those classic dishes that people either love or hate. Like Marmite or blue cheese, natto has a very strong smell and intense flavour that can definitely be an acquired taste.”

https://www.japancentre.com/en/recipes/45-idees-de-recettes-a-base-de-natto-feves-de-soja-fermentees

Highly recommended and just out!

THE LIFE AND ZEN HAIKU POETRY OF SANTOKA TANEDA

https://www.tuttlepublishing.com/japan/the-life-and-zen-haiku-poetry-of-santoka-taneda

*** 

the boldness

of a rose...

withering

Eva Limbach

Eva says:

“Boldness ... something I’ve ever struggled with. Is it bold to bloom, to be beautiful or is it bold to wither with heads held high? Mayby boldness is to accept life as it is and not to fight ...Guess we'll never know!”

A favorite haiku:

spring cloud —

taking myself

a little less seriously

Teiichi Suzuki 

The Mainichi (Japan, May 2021)

Eva says:

“This lightness I love and I feel also in my haiku. Spring, a new beginning and a new decision. What about seriousness? Do you need it or do you just accept your life and make the best of it? I'll work on it.”

 My favorite quotes from “Waiting for Godot”:

“Estragon: Nothing to be done.”

 My favorite quotes from  “Withnail and I”:

 I recommend you smoke some more grass.

Eva said:

“That was really a big challenge for me.Love your unconventional concept.”

*** 

 

 

the shutter snaps…

soft focus photographs

turn back time

 

Marilyn Humbert

 

If only we could turn back time. A second change to do things better.

 

 

Favourite Haikai verse

 

Summer grasses,

all that remains

of soldiers’ dreams

Matsuo Bashō

Trans. Lucien Stryk

On Love and Barley – Haiku of Basho

 

This haiku is timeless and still as relevant today as it was when it was written.  It resonates across all borders and with all people. I love the sadness embodied with just 8 words and 12 syllables (in the English translation).

 

 

Waiting for Godot:

“Let's go." "We can't." "Why not?" "We're waiting for Godot.”
 

Withnail and I

Withnail: Listen, we're bona fide, we're not from London.

 

Alan note:

夏草や兵どもが夢の跡

natsukusa ya tsuwamonodomo ga yume no ato

composed June 29, 1689

More about the summer grasses hokku verse by Matsuo Bashō

https://area17.blogspot.com/2006/04/bashos-summer-grasses.html

On Love and Barley: Haiku of Basho

Lucien Stryk (Translator) 

Penguin Books 1987

https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/350/35095/on-love-and-barley/9780140444599.html 

 

*** 

Weeping alone

me, that willow

and our shadows

Maryam Qureshi

“This haiku is reflective of my inner feeling of loneliness and isolation during all the hard times of my life that I had to face alone. It is also a voice of all the victims of the pandemic, the times of isolation that humanity faced at the icy hands of coronavirus.”

My favorite haiku:

Social distancing circles

the overlapping shadows

connect everyone

Hifsa Ashraf

Overall Winner

The 3rd Basho-an International English Haiku Competition, 2020

“I like this haiku because it has a strong feeling of the inevitable connection between human souls even after being isolated apparently.”

Favorite quote from Waiting for Godot:

"Stay with me.

Did I leave you?

You let me go."

Favorite quote from Withnail and I.

"Look at me. I'm 30 in a month and I've got a sole flapping off my shoe."

Alan’s note:

'Social distancing': how a 1950s phrase came to dominate 2020

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2020/may/28/social-distancing-how-a-1950s-phrase-came-to-dominate-2020

Maryam Qureshi ’s Songs Of Cardinal (April 2021)

https://www.amazon.com/Songs-Cardinal-Maryam-Qureshi/dp/B091G6J8L4

Hifsa Ashraf:

https://hifsayz.wordpress.com/books-reviews/

*** 

planting rice

the farmer's feet

deep in the mud

Nay Lorie Lolie

(Loreta C. Bande, Philippines)

“With this I wish the homemakers around the world would prepare just enough food each day to avoid throwing away a lot of leftovers. Farmers labor hard to feed us yet they still hear people in some parts of this earth going hungry. With a little planning, no one would go hungry.”

Favorite haiku:

how could I forget

the thorn I saw in your voice

when you spoke in signs

Gingging T. Dumdum

(Ma. Milagros Teleron Dumdum)

“She's my mathematics professor who has been writing haiku since high school and has published two books of haiku and one of tanka in collaboration with her husband, Judge Simeon Dumdum. A book of haibun is in the process of publication. In the haiku I've chosen, she shows the gift of seeing the heart in pain and long remembers it as if it's her own.”

Withnail and I

Peter Marwood ( I ):

And all at once those frozen hours melt through the nervous system, and seep out the pores

Waiting For Godot by Samuel Beckett

There's man all over for you, blaming on his boots the fault of his feet.

*** 

a covid summer night …

the young widow’s silence 

speaks to me

 

Amrutha Prabhu

“Covid has been harsh on all of us. There has been losses all over. The silence of a relative on her husband’s death…speaks volumes. There are times when we find ourselves between our words. I let the poem make the connect.”

 

One of MY FAVOURITE HAIKU:

 

into the night a cuckoo returns the call 

Kala Ramesh

Kokako, annual print edition, September 2007

 

“I love the many possible disjunctions here. The presence of mate is unknown until we reach “the call”. Every word very meaningfully placed, letting the reader savour it to his/her degree of getting into the call.”

 

THE QUOTES:

 

Waiting for Godot: 

We are all born crazy. Some of us remain that way.

Withnail and I : 

Alright, this is the plan. We will get in there and get wrecked.

 

Alan note:

Check out:

beyond the horizon beyond (2017)

Kala Ramesh

https://www.amazon.in/beyond-horizon-Kala-Ramesh/dp/B075V6HHKR/ref=sr_1_4?dchild=1&keywords=Kala+Ramesh+haiku&qid=1623760734&sr=8-4