Michele’s Musings
Wow and congratulations to the winners of the 2025 Solitary Daisy Haiku Contest! Sally and I had to drink a lot of coffee and eat a lot of cupcakes but we had such a great time reading all of the more than 400 entries. We would like to have chosen a lot more of you because the haiku were all so good.
Sally had an idea to post a few collections from the February Haiku Month prompts and this issue has ten haiku each from our two favourite submissions.
And finally, we can’t believe we have hit 50 issues! Thanks for coming along on this amazing journey with us! It’s great to have made so many haiku friends and we cherish each and every one of you.
Numbers
first blind date
a cherry tomato
in one bite
Chen-ou Liu
Ajax, Ontario, Canada
four petal stars scatter
fallen forsythia
on Buddha’s robe
Cherie Hanson
Kelowna, BC
origami hearts
seven thousand paper cuts
to build this freedom
Ceó Ruaírc
bungee jumping on 3 —
the wind
in her hair
Lisa C Reynolds
Durham Region, Ontario
facing fifty-five
still don’t know what I want to be
when I grow up
Tracy Davidson , UK
49 degrees
under the coolibah tree –
billabong thirsty
Anna Dean, Australia
spring cleaning –
a tattered childhood memory
of three little pigs
Paul Callus, Malta
my friend
with Parkinson’s
his 18-year sunset
Tony Williams
Scotland, UK
Member News
This week has seen a couple of our members showcased on Tiny Words.
grave frost
in my cupped hands
a robin’s weight
-C.X.Turner
the call to prayers —
in the din of Diwali
a ghee lamp glistens
-Monica Kakkar
I was absolutely delighted to read this update from member Kim Klugh.
“This week I’m visiting my daughter and her family in Michigan, and since April is national poetry month, she asked if I wanted to help her lead a little poetry workshop in my grandson’s second grade classroom. We introduced a brief history and the format of haiku to them, read a few children’s haiku poems aloud, composed a haiku together as a class, brainstormed some spring kigo and then each student tried a haiku on their own. What a fun session!”
What an inspiration you are, Kim! Thank you for helping bring haiku to a new generation of readers and writers.
Here’s a name we know, found in the results of the AHS 2025 Autumn Equinox Kukai
Fifth place (38 points): Nitu Yumnam, UAE
the squeezed toes
of a newborn
anemone bud
Nan Brady is featured in Zen Peacemakers for the month of April. Beautiful work, Nan!
mallard ducklings...
in their wake
cherry blossoms
- Nancy Brady,
USA
Sofia Conoway has a haiku exhibition coming up at Butterfly World in lovely Coombs, BC. Check out the graphic below.
The latest issue of Enchanted Garden has been released, and I see a number of our subscribers featured. Also included, our own Michele Rule!
Sally’s Notebook
Sally’s Notebook
“Worry never robs tomorrow of its sorrow, it only saps today of its joy.”
-Leo Buscaglia
To say my life has been in turmoil recently would be an understatement. A couple of years ago, I took a deep breath and went in search of my birth mother. It was surprisingly easy to find her, and as fate would have it, she only lived an hour and a half away.
what do I wear
the first time I meet
my mother
We met, cautiously at first, but gradually with phone calls and visits, we began to get to know each other. Through photo albums, I got to see my four (yes, four!) sisters as they grew up.
A few weeks ago, she surprised me by asking if my son and I would like to move in with her. The more I thought about it, the better the idea became. Not only would my son and I be paying less rent, but she would have help with yardwork and the upkeep of her house. And the big one, of course, is I would be there if something were to happen to her.
We set a tentative date, and I began making plans. Mostly pages and pages of lists. We would have to get rid of almost everything we owned, due to lack of space, and I even went so far as to separate my books into those I couldn’t part with, and those I could.
Naturally, I was worried. Here I am, almost sixty years old, preparing to move in with my mother, whom I barely know. Anxious moments, sleepless nights, and an insane paralysis that found me on occasion holding my breath. What if it turned out we didn’t like each other? What if I wasn’t up to the task of potentially becoming her caregiver? But it just made so much sense! Whatever problems arose, I would deal with them when they arrived.
Then, on Thursday, she called me. She changed her mind, she said, and didn’t want us to come live with her. I took the news stoically. I didn’t try to change her mind. I didn’t want to coerce her. But – not gonna lie – my feelings were deeply hurt.
I didn’t want to talk to anyone. I needed time to process this new shift in my reality. But I had to talk to my son, who had been busy making plans of his own.
We went to the beach and shared a sandwich while looking out at the lake. The lake was a brilliant blue rippling silver in the sun. Through the newly budding trees, the mountains were a pale blue in the distance. Slowly, my son drew my feelings out of me, and while I felt a bit better after talking to him, I still went straight to bed when we got home, even though the sun was still up.
I didn’t sleep. All those anxious feelings I’d been having completely flipped and a whole new set of worries settled in. The sun was already bright in the sky before I finally fell into a fitful sleep.
I took my morning (afternoon) coffee outside and sat on the deck. There are purple violets sprouting all over my yard. There are leaves popping on the lilac bush, and the quail are squawking their way through the neighborhood. I tried to think about all that had happened the day before, but the only thing that came to mind was the blue, blue lake and the mountains. The feel of new grass beneath my fingertips and the warmth of the sun.
Why was I grieving for an unknowable future? I just needed to look around at all I have. We may not have money, but our lives are rich. Maybe I needed this experience to see that. Here, now, this moment – that’s what is important.
Why am I telling you all this? I don’t know. But I’m pretty sure there is a haiku in there somewhere.
February Prompt Collections
Congratulations to Emil Karla and kjmunro for being chosen as the best collections from February’s prompt calendar!
Valentine’s Day
his pet lizard
crawls up his leg
prompt: ‘lizard’
childhood innocence
giant soap bubbles
burst
prompt "bubbles"
spelling bee she misses hive mind
prompt "bee"
not writing a poem about spring cleaning either
prompt: ‘spring cleaning’
empty nest
a cache of memories
squirrelled away
prompt: ‘flying squirrel’
basement flooded with emotion
prompt: ‘flooded stream’
towering rhodos kaleidoscope colours childhood
prompt: ‘azalea’
Sea of Tranquility
she makes new tracks
in her moon boots
prompt: ‘tranquility’
parents away again
the aunt watches the children
blossom
prompt: ‘blossoms’
grandpa’s diary
rereading the horrors
of mustard gas
prompt: ‘mustard’
kjmunro
lilac wine
last night’s quiet evening
with her
slushy brain
my David Lynch moment
by the open door
her calves in leather windy bike lane
my sons on screen—
an unknown puppy
in their arms
the strength it takes
to clean the Augean stables
clear eastern sky
between nests—stork airpaths of child custody
tadpole mood small talk in the barroom
lingering snow children leaving their hometown
parenting Sunday—my childhood dandelion strolls
first sunny day
I push her bike
through the crowd
Emil Karla
Places To Submit
The 2025 Sanford Goldstein International Tanka Contest is now open! Tanka is another Japanese short form, but more personal than haiku. Submissions close May 31st.
Submissions are open for the May Issue of Sense & Sensibility Haiku. Submissions close April 22nd, 2025, at 6 pm EST, unless they reach their quota sooner. Please submit early to increase your chances of being published.
The Peggy Willis Lyles Haiku Awards for 2025 by Heron’s Nest are open now until June 1st . There are some great cash prizes up for grabs and first place also wins the coveted miniature crystal turtle!
Bottle Rockets has had a change in editor! Congratulations to Tom Sacramona on taking over the lead. Important note: entries within the US must be mailed in while other may be emailed. Open now – closes May 15th.
Woodend Haiku Festival in Australia runs from April 1st to 30th. Along with a number of onsite activities there is a Haiku contest on the theme of autumn. Under 18 and Open Age sections. Book prizes for the two winners. Free entry.
Hexapod Haiku Challenge! is open! Along with regular hexapod haiku there is a special topic award this year for the best haiku featuring ground-dwelling arthropods. Have fun with that! March 15th through June 15th.
Remember the Vancouver Cherry Blossom Festival is on now with events all over Vancouver! The associated Haiku Invitational has also begun, with submissions closing on June 1st. Haiku for this contest must be on the subject of cherry blossoms.
This Week’s Prompt
For our next issue, we want to feature our members who don’t speak English as their first language! Please send us one haiku in your mother tongue, along with an English translation. We are really excited to hear from you!
April’s air stirs in― Bashō Matsuo
willow-leaves…a butterfly
floats and balances
Michele Rule is a disabled writer from Kelowna BC. She is especially interested in the topics of chronic illness, relationships and nature. Michele is published in the Asahi Shimbun Haikuist, Pine Cone Review, the Enchanted Garden, Five Minute Lit, Shadow Pond, WordCityLit, and the anthologies F*ck the Patriarchy, Chicken Soup for the Soul, and To Live Here, among others. She is an associate member of the League of Canadian Poets and Haiku Canada. Michele has been awarded honourable mention twice for the Vancouver Cherry Blossom Festival Haiku Invitational and also for the Haiku Northwest Porad Award. Her first chapbook is Around the World in Fifteen Haiku. Michele lives in a beautiful garden surrounded by people who love her just the way she is.
Sally Quon is a disabled poet and photographer living in the Okanagan Valley of beautiful British Columbia, Canada. She is an associate member of The League of Canadian Poets and a member of Haiku Canada. Her work has been published in numerous journals including The Heron’s Nest, Modern Haiku, Frogpond, First Frost, and Time Haiku. She is currently working on her first book of haiku, haibun, and haiga, tentatively titled, “My Valley, My Home.”
Featherstone Creative
