Two Haiku for One Night
October is nearly at its end.
The open woods here are a mix of leafless branches and bright bursts of color, while the old farmyards boast the brilliant red of sugar maples, which have turned beautifully this year. We are just recovering from an early first snow as well. The animals have not appreciated it, but the garden thought it just the thing after weeks of dry weather.
It has not been an easy month for me, hence my absence here, but it has certainly been full of a raw sort of excitement.
The plan to move back to Arizona nearly became an on-the-ground reality, only to be quashed by the state of the housing market: too tight to find an appropriate property for my sister and myself and my beloved horses. Memories of our disastrous home purchase two years ago have now saved us from making a similar error, but only at the cost of much frustration and not a little disappointment.
Someday I shall tell the full story of the ghastly house purchase that saved our lives but was too horrible to live in… but not today!
Today I shall look again at the little things around me. I am likely to live here through another winter now, as Covid-19 is sweeping this state, limiting hospital intake in rural counties, while many locals—both average citizens and their political representatives—still apparently can’t bring themselves to simply wear face masks or social distance enough to cut down the increasing disease. It seems a bad time to attempt a cross-country move with all the unavoidable exposure that would entail.
So as ever, I turn to my friends in nature. I have just begun writing again, using the simple beauty of haiku to find a way back into words.
This pair of haiku was written in my head one night as I went out to care for the horses. The first one was composed almost backward: the second and third lines were complete before I walked back indoors, but the first has been revised repeatedly, the last time just now! I believe the three lines now express the sensations that wrapped round me as walked out into the night.
The second was crafted in its entirety as I completed my work outside. One nice thing about the brevity of haiku is the relative ease with which it can be remembered whilst composing it! I often jot my lines down on my phone while outdoors, but sometimes it is more convenient to simply memorize them.
I present them as I actually write them, e.g. without titles.
Night chill around me~
Shy tingle of new-made rain
Surprises my face.
On the fence a drop,
In the drop a second moon
More distant than ours.
Hope next month will be better for you. And what comes after that, too. Your haiku are amazing. I especially like the second one. It reaches from the very small to the unimaginable unending greatness of the universe. And somewhere in that universe, stars will collide and you will one day realize that the disappointment of this month, was in fact these stars telling you to wait for the blessing still to come.
I hope and wish.