Right now, something that gives me sustenance is attempting to write Haiku. I don’t want to write long sentences with frippery and slippery language. I also want to escape what’s inside my head, and it is helpful to engage my brain with a strict 5-7-5 syllable format, even though in modern Haiku that is probably not cool anymore.

Here are some:

Rain on the windscreen/Calm wisdom of the still trees/As it seeps to their roots

Blush flower stands still/Petals fall one by one/Echo of its soul stays

Deer dotted in grass/Sun cracks in the autumn sky/Herd moves to winter

Old trees keeping watch/On dog souls and children’s souls/Milk of Mother Nature

Skeletal leaf forms/On the cloudy autumn sky/Summer dreams falling

Stardust falls to earth/Becomes part of who we are/We rise to the skies

Song thrushes jostling/On damp Dublin pavements/Early morning joy

Trees in autumn blaze/There is God in your stillness/Golden angel hues

Church bells ring out loud/City traffic hums and roars/Crisp blue autumn sky

Spiderweb spun cloud/Delicate as the rainfall/City starts its day

Happy cloud poodle/Bursting with life and hope/Bold winter beauty

Lightening against the sky/Nature’s own nucleus/Marvellous Maple

And here’s one that cracked my 7-year-old up when I read it out to him, putting things in perspective somewhat, and made me want to try to write more Haiku that would make him laugh:

Pencil case puppy/You lie on the windowsill/While I am crying

Finally, it’s not a Haiku, but rereading Ezra Pound’s In the Station of the Metro blew my mind a little:

The apparition of these faces in the crowd:

Petals on a wet, black bough.

Perfection in a little poem.