when february is here - NaHaiWriMo, third week

The third week at NaHaiWriMo was all about nouns and since haiku is, more often than not, written about nouns, many among us must have had sighed in relief,but though it started innocuously enough,later on in the week, we were again left struggling. At least, I did. The easiest words are sometimes the most difficult to write to. The prompts were: Nest, Nickel,Nosebleed (yes, that's right, nosebleed it was), Neon, Nuance, Notebook and Newlywed.

A few that I managed to write:

nickel moon

the shine

in the beggar-girl's eyes

neon sky

the pavement sleeper mumbles

in his dream

cloudless sky

how the blackbirds fill it

song by song

Newly Married--
the car idling 

by the tiger-lily bush

when february is here - NaHaiWriMo, second week

Into the second week and if I had thought things would become easier after the adverb prompts, I was soon proved wrong.This week's prompts were all about adjectives and they were: Native, Nuclear,Novel (not as a noun, but as an adjective, mind you), Northwest ,Numeric,New-fangled and Neuter.

Here are a few of what I wrote in response.

trailing lily roots-

the boatman sings

in his native tongue

nuclear family

the button

in the new-born's hands

northwest wind-
the desert-rimmed eyes
of the camel

loft ladder

seven wobbly steps

to the stars

pencil shavings-

all these days

without a poem

when February is here... NaHaiWriMo, first week

February,known as the shortest month for writing the shortest form of poetry, has been synonymous for me with NahaiWriMo since  2012. Though NaHaiWriMo continues on Facebook throughout the year,February is special as NaHaiWriMo founder Michael Dylan Welch himself is the prompter this month with a new prompt each day and many old and new poets in the haiku community join in and take up the challenge."Challenge"...hmm, you can say that again, because MDW is a real tough and ruthless prompter and it gets really challenging to tackle the prompts he throws our way day in , day out. Yet that must be the reason why NHWM is on its 5th year and I am doing it for the fourth year in a row.And if you're not participating in this February event, yet inquisitive about it , read on.

This year all the prompts star with the alphabet "N" (as part of a continuing alphabetical series. Last month Chrissi Villa's prompts had all started with "M" and next month it would be "O" and so on.) and we were informed that in the first week, they would all be adverbs Though I had sat and made a list of all the N-words we are likely to encounter in the course of this month, I had never bargained for this twist in the tale.

However, these were the prompts for the first week and my own rather feeble responses to some of them.

1st Feb:  NOW

now...

the distance between

me and my teacup

2nd Feb:  NOISILY

hard rain

how noisily he strums

the guitar

3rd Feb:  NERVOUSLY

midnight gravel crunch

the way the old house

stiffens

4TH Feb:  NAKEDLY

storefront mannequin so nakedly the dawn

5th Feb:  NONSTOP

nonstop the woods till the cicadas' end

6th Feb:  NONCHALANTLY

no thoughts

of tomorrow...

falling petals

7th Feb: NEAREST

paper boat
the poem that found
the Polaris

January NaHaiWriMo - week two

The second week at NaHaiWriMo...the prompts were: Mesh,Mango, Manhole, Mosaic,Maze, Meadow and Mantel.

And the ku I wrote were:

window mesh-

the spider weaves 

a sunbeam

paisleys-

a whiff of summer

in the swish of her skirt

manhole night the beginning of another world

cracked mosaic--

a gnarled branch

against the sky

corn maze

the wind will have

its way

morning fog

the meadow lost

in cowbells

shrugging off

the mantle of clouds

Eucalypts

January nahaiwrimo, week one

NaHaiWriMo is always fun.Since I've not been able to get down to writing small stones, I started doing Chrissi Villa's prompts on nahaiwrimo this month and this is my first week's harvest. The prompts were :Mirror, Marmalade,Murmur,Morsel,Melody, Magnolia and Mask.


gleaming mirror
my questions thrown back
at me



black currant jam
I scoop out a spoonful
of darkness



snaking
across the forest floor
the murmur
of a fire



first morsel-
a mouthful
of toothless smile



windchimes
one or two ripples
in the pond



magnolia buds...
the words you write
on the window-pane


halloween night
everywhere
the raccoon eyes