Fall Haiga

Image poetry - revised/re-posted from Sept. 2024

entering a moment - how the light filters in memory

Dear Readers,

I hope you are well this Thanksgiving weekend. To those who have been with me since Ibis and Hibiscus, the Florida Blogger, and through my WIX adoptee blog era, thanks so much for being here! And to my new followers and subscribers, I’m so glad you’re here, and welcome!

If you haven’t seen how Roots & Branches has progressed over the past two-plus years, a recent post reflects on my writing since this spring; why I’d been off-site since February. I’ve linked the note here.
I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Here in south-central New Jersey, it’s a dreary football Sunday, with nothing to offer me but my keyboard and cozy room. This final day of November I’ve updated an Early Fall post — from 2024 — now in its new section, Seasons.

Damp breezes have scattered the maple leaves, and landscapers have scarfed them up into monster shredders. The trucks have gone, I hope, to a great leaf mulch depository, and spread on gardens come spring.

Haiga by MelG (Rocky Strand Unsplash)

The persistent oaks cling to their leathery leaves well into winter, scarlet deepening to russet-red before their tawny-brown warms the pine woods out our windows. (a.i.gen. image, my prompt)

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Haiga - An image paired with a Japanese style poem, like Haiku, Senryu, or Tanka, is called Haiga or Shahai.

Tanka - Walk amid the/autumn brambles/ don’t avoid the scrapes and scratches/face the light, now remember/and don’t ignore the sorrows (Tanka - Northampton Cty. PA)

A burst of fall/fades in winter light/number the days in poems/every minute is yours/so take it, then let it go. (Tanka, Sarasota, FL)

A rain of music follows golden light through the valley of poems

Tanka Autumn koi - make ready, swirl in delight/only accept winter’s weight in stillness/as thaw must soon return. melg. photo S. Whitehouse

‘Portrait of Matsuo Bashō by Yokoi Kinkoku, c. 1820. The calligraphy relates one of Bashō’s most famous haiku poems: Furu ike ya / kawazu tobikomu / mizu no oto (An old pond / a frog jumps in / the sound of water).caption...’

I invite you to read this description and history of the Japanese art form.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haiga#/media/File:Basho_by_Kinkoku_c1820.jpg and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haiga

Thank you for being here at Seasons/Roots&Branches. Your subscriptions, follows, and comments support my work.

P.S. Wednesday will be the third installment of “Through The Yew Hedge: A Tale of Identity Magic” (by my fiction pen name, Islay Corwin). Here’s a brief description, should you like to venture a read:

“When infant Ruth Ann is found in a fairy ring on the Winter Solstice, botanist Sarah Caldwell becomes mother to a foundling whose heritage bridges two worlds. As the child grows into her three names—Ruth Ann, Stella, and Questa—morning glories bloom out of season, mirrors show more than reflections, and a medieval garden reveals its magical purpose. A story of adoption, identity, and the search for belonging, where Celtic folklore meets botanical mystery in a garden that remembers everything.”

Catch up here

© Mary Ellen Gambutti