Category Archives: meditative poetry

Haiku Holiday turns 40

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The North Carolina Haiku Society hosts an all-day meeting on the last Saturday of each April. This year marked the 40th year of these days called “Haiku Holiday.” Each of the past 40 years has been hosted by one wonderful poet and woman, Jean Earnhardt

on Bolin Brook Farm, an old farmstead that has been in her family for 12 generations. Can you imagine opening up your home and garden annually to a large group of poets? Jean does so graciously and with a welcoming, inclusive attitude. Thank you, Jean!

 

“In honor of the 40th anniversary of Haiku Holiday, we read 40 haiku by current and past members of the North Carolina Haiku Society. Crystal Simone-Smith selected the poems and published them as a broadside.”  (Dave Russo, the NCHS website Editor)

 

The Broadside is so beautiful, and it’s an honor to be part of this. My two haiku are listed below. My thanks to Crystal for selecting this to be included.

 

Haiku Holiday, NCHS, 2019

40 Years, 40 Haiku: A Broadside

 

 

dandelion—

more and more invisible

as I grow old

 

 

our country’s story

ever evolving

. . . fallen blossoms

 

 

Both haiku by Mary Kendall (c) 2019

 

War memorial (a haiku)

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As Memorial Day approaches, thoughts of all who have sacrificed for our country come to mind. There have been so many wars, so many skirmishes, so many of our service people posted to regions far away from their homeland. The work they do in times of war or in conflict is something that requires a level of courage I don’t have. Yet we can all pay them our deepest respects and honor those who have died as well as those who came home. They have made this country what it is.

 

This haiku was published in Frogpond 42.1, Winter 2019 (Haiku Society of North America)

 

 

war memorial

blue dragonflies

loop in tandem

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Starlight on winter branches

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Two haiku and one tanka in Blithe Spirit 29.1, 2019

 

      *

 

ground fog
even birdsong
is invisible

 

*

 

wood’s edge –
that inescapable pull
of darkness

          *

 

starlight on
winter branches—
those nagging thoughts
that seem to come
from nowhere

 

 

All poems by Mary Kendall

 

 

Faulty footing . . . (two tanka)

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 Red Lights, Volume 15, No. 1, January 2019:

 

 

 

 

Both tanka by Mary Kendall

that look . . . (haiku/senryu)

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Modern Haiku, Volume 50.1, Winter-Spring 2019

 

 

 

that look . . .   

a skim coat of ice

in the bird bath

 

 

 

 

 

Frozen Birdbath with Frozen Ripples (c) Terry Gray

 

 

unearthing beauty (rengay)

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My deepest thanks to Kate MacQueen for writing this rengay with me. It was a wonderful and illuminating experience to write with Kate. Kate’s verses are #2, 4, 6 (italicized) and mine are #1, 3, 5.

 

This rengay was published in Vines #3, part of the publication hedgerow edited by Caroline Skanne. 

 

Note: for readers not acquainted with rengay, here is a definition from “Graceguts” by Michael Dylan Welch:

“Garry Gay invented a renga alternative in the summer of 1992: the “rengay.”

“The rengay is a collaborative six-verse linked thematic poem written by two or three poets using alternating three-line and two-line haiku or haiku-like stanzas in a regular pattern. The pattern for two people is A-3, B-2, A-3, B-3, A-2, B-3, with the letters representing the poets, and the numbers indicating the number of lines in each given verse.” 

dreams lost in dreams . . . (three haiku)

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Three haiku were also published in Presence, Issue #62, 2018:

 

1.

 

dreams lost in dreams wild poppies

 

 

Field of Poppies, Photographer Unknown

 

2.

 

“Snow” by gookingsword (Pixabay)

 

 

 

deep in winter

abandoned nests

and forgotten songs

 

 

 

3.

 

waking from a dream

the night winds

unsettle the moon

 

 

Photo by Kenrick Mills on Unsplash