rocking chair

rocking chair
back and forth
between now and then


Frogpond,
Vol 34.3, 2011

from crocus to crocus

photo: Akky

from crocus to crocus -
the spider adding
a new dimension

frogpond,
vol 34.3, 2011

Haiga 17

where i stop,
they take off...
gulls at the pier's end

Submission declined

So what do you do when you get a mail declining your submission? Ask me. Because I get plenty of them. Usually, it doesn't bother me much. I feel dejected for a while, sometimes i mope even the whole day, but by next morning, i'm myself again, planning something new, be it the next submission, next post or something totally unrelated to poetry. Anybody who has anything to do with the written word and wants to be published knows these""rejections" are part and parcel of a writer's life. And i also know that nine times out of ten my work is below par, so these small disappointments are going to happen from time to time; no sweat! I've been fortunate enough to have editors who have... right from the time i was just a newbie, taking my first uncertain steps on the haiku path... indulged me and even when not accepting my work, have always had the time to stop by and say something soothing and nice, to soften the blow. Lately even very senior editors and poets have been gracious enough to add a few encouraging words while not accepting. Then there are editors who have not replied at all,either to say 'yes' or 'no', but when persisted with, have responded with a poem or two,( of which you may or may not make any sense of), but i mean, it's damn sweet of them to do that! And some even have gone to the length of explaining what exactly was wrong with the poem, what i should do to improve upon it and why they/he/she couldn't accept.But then sometimes i get a mail which does not only contain a curt message; polite curtness is acceptable to some extent; but there is such an air of unspoken condescension in the wording of these mails, that it gets my goat.Is it necessary to put "submission declined" in capitals in the subject line? Couldn't that be included in the body of the message? Do they decline everybody in the same way? Same guidelines apply to everyone?Maybe I am over-reacting, i am prone to doing that sometimes. But I definitely think that only being an editor is not enough, you also need to learn how to say 'no' with gentleness and humour; maybe you ought to learn a thing or two about graciousness from the senior editors!

"Your praying for rain's

ridiculous!"

reed thrush

 

-Issa, 1819

Oh well, enough of my rant! Time to go cheer myself up with some music. Perhaps you too would like to join me here .
Roughly translated it means I spin(katiya karoon) the cotton (roon) of your memories and words throughout the night.

riverbank

riverbank~
dipping my toes
in winter clouds

(Sketchbook, Nov-Dec, 2010
'winter clouds' kukai,
2nd place)

A haibun

I have been fascinated by haibun for quite some time, though never been able to write one. Sooner or later, i will. Meanwhile, in order to educate myself , i have been reading up a lot of haibun on all the online journals. Here is one such haibun that i came upon on my reading spree. Many of you might have read it already, but this is for those who have not and who are too lazy even to click upon a link. So here i bring it to you on a platter: titled Self Surrender, from Modern Haiku, winter-spring 2010 issue, by Carol Pearce-Worthington.

Self Surrender dusk. fireflies avoiding my fingers we eat lunch at a drugstore counter near the courthouse and he buys a paperback book that he hopes to take with him and we walk east to the fortress within which somehow live and breathe the ill conceived the unfortunates the police the prosecutors the guards the unthinkable the mummified and we climb stone stairs into the stone walled waiting area where we stand because we cannot sit and we cannot speak and him now with no choice but to go on into this tomb and to leave me returning to the street alone and he cannot make himself go and so police wearing plain clothes come out and take his arms and lead him to the gate and unthinkingly I call to him the three men turn and I salute him us our future lost and he says only yes and a guard opens the doorway wired to a metal detector and he walks through it how far does a star fall in the night sky

by Carol Pearce-Worthington

Halloween "spirits"

night chill...
raiding the cellar
in search of spirits

Halloween or All Hallow's eve was celebrated in the West yesterday (Monday, 31st October).The prompt by Pris Campbell at NaHaiWriMo was 'ghosts or spirits' and this was my response .

Here's Michele Harvey on the same prompt at the same forum :

wind chill-
the creak on the stairs
when nobody's there

And this is what Stella Pierides had to say:

ghosts -
wherever you look
a double-burger

There is a great haiga by Sheila Windsor as well , but you better visit the NaHaiWriMo page for that.And you must go take a look at Rick Daddario's halloween haiga here.