Haiku Practice
It’s election day and I’m like the title of this blog: wild like a live wire. I’m trying to ground myself and just wrote a haiku. I’ve been thinking about and wanting to start a regular haiku practice for years. I’m not sure why I never put pen to paper. Or why I decided to post here after 3 years.
Maybe it’s because recently, I taught a “living poem” workshop at the Nasher Museum’s Reflection Program. In that session, we used select artwork at the museum as a jumping off place for storytelling. The theme of the day was water. From our stories, we generated haiku. And then we animated the poems by adding gesture. It was beautiful. It was beautiful.
And then today, in my own world of anxiety and trying to counter that anxiety with something, anything, maybe creativity? I wrote a haiku of my own. I hope to share more here and hope that others who are longing for a small, manageable poetry practice might be inspired to take up one of their own.
November 5th
Jack-o-lanterns rot
Their black smiles drooping for earth
Feed for spring flowers
Maybe my creative subconscious is trying to tell me that this election, like everything else, is part of a cycle. Soil feeds plants, plants feed us, our waste feeds the soil (kind of) and on and on. I am part of this tiny moment that also feels so big. If you are reading this, I’m glad we are in this cycle together.
Below: images from my See Saw Projects, Living Poem workshop at the Nasher.
