hedgerow #24

Posted on April 10, 2015 by Caroline Skanne

welcome to #24 of hedgerow! a warm thank you to contributors & readers alike. if you have a look around the site, you will notice a few new additions, including book reviews & poet spotlight. exciting times.

with love & kindness.

the robin dips
below the fence
sunset

from
her
balcony
the
starlit
city

giving in
for now
low tide

Dave Read is a Canadian poet whose work has appeared in many journals, including hedgerow. You can find his micropoetry on Twitter, @AsSlimAsImBeing.

early morning
before the alarm
the cat

A pharmacist by profession, a haiku poet by nature, Nancy Brady reads and writes, living on the coast of Lake Erie in Huron, Ohio. She has two books of poetry: Ohayo Haiku and Three Breaths.

ice ages and motel mini fridges
tumbling over the
endless mountains

Mike Andrelczyk is currently living in Strasburg, PA. Also lived in Los Angeles, Ca. and Lewes, De. He likes writing haiku about the ocean, potatoes, moons, plants – mostly little things except the ocean which is huge, and the moon which looks little but isn’t. Follow on Twitter @MikeAndrelczyk.

first warm day . . .
leaf-shaped holes
in the ice

midway
tying the jacket
around my waist

Julie Warther (@JulieWarther) lives in Dover, Ohio and serves as Midwest Regional Coordinator for the Haiku Society of America. (www.hsa-haiku.org). Her haiku chapbook “What Was Here” is available through Folded Word Press. http://foldedword.bigcartel.com/product/what-was-here

Barbara Kaufmann can be found (or lost) wandering in the woods, beaches and gardens of New York, her camera and notebook in hand, hunting for poems.http://wabisabipoet.wordpress.com/

plum breeze
i breathe petals
into your kiss

Grant Savage is an Ottawa, Ontario, Canada amateur poet and photographer. After the recent, long cold winter in Eastern Canada, he is increasingly being recognized as the fair weather animal he has long considered himself to be. A poetry writing, and perpetually hungry groundhog. Sleepy greetings from Ottawa!

on the shelf
Selected Poems by Chen-ou Liu
a nagging voice
at the back of my mind
says, is that all there is?

held by her words
You’re a useless poet …
I walk out,
slamming the door
behind my old self

she tells me,
I just found
a studio apartment
the eyes I love most
focus somewhere else

for a week
no one but the wind
comes to call …
the flames of self-doubt
envelop my body

Chen-ou Liu is currently the editor and translator of NeverEnding Story, http://neverendingstoryhaikutanka.blogspot.ca/, and the author of five books, including Following the Moon to the Maple Land (First Prize, 2011 Haiku Pix Chapbook Contest) and A Life in Transition and Translation (Honorable Mention, 2014Turtle Light Press Biennial Haiku Chapbook Competition).

a touch of malice
builds in a March wind …
our enthusiasm
for cherry blossoms
begins to wane

Lolly Williams, from California, is a little magpie who collects scraps of words, phrases, images and other shiny things for her short form poetry and mixed media art. Her work can be found in various print and online publications.

Alexis Rotella (Arnold, Maryland, USA) served as Haiku Society of America President in 1984, her famous poem Purple appears in Creative Writing: An Intro to Poetry and Fiction St. Martin’s Press, Teaching with Heart (Jossey-Bass, San Francisco, 2014).

Queen of Hearts

On our way home from dinner at our favorite Indian restaurant, Blue and I find three playing cards face-down on the sidewalk near our house. Blue turns them over, one by one, as we try to guess what’s on the other side. They are the seven of clubs, three of spades, and queen of hearts. We didn’t guess a single one right, though we both wanted to say queen of hearts but were embarrassed to be that corny. I’m superstitious and don’t want to bring the cards into the house. I hold them by their corners and carry them to the nearby mailbox, leaving them face-down on the rounded top for someone else to discover. By the next day they are gone. But later that week, coming out of a different restaurant, we see another card, the jack of clubs, face-up on the street. We step over it.

hurrying past
the fortune-teller’s window
i stumble

Zee Zahava live in Ithaca, New York and is the editor of brass bell, an online haiku journal:
http://brassbellhaiku.blogspot.com

hedgerow #23

Posted on April 3, 2015 by Caroline Skanne

welcome to #23 of hedgerow, featuring 13 different poets & artists. this first issue of April celebrates spring flowers! enjoy.

with love & kindness…

https://www.facebook.com/wildflowerpoetrypress

https://www.facebook.com/hedgerowpoems

pale and watery
in my bones
I need red flowers tonight

even here
atop the ferris wheel
honeysuckle

3 red flowers
in a teapot vase
keeping me company
when you are away

the untuned piano
flowers dying in the vase
even the mail is late —
when will you be home?

lilacs
thank you
for filling my empty spaces

first slow rain of summer
dear iris
there you are
reveling in your
luscious self
making the most of all
your moments

beside the monastery
a plastic chicken
guards baby tulips

Zee Zahava looks for flowers each morning as she walks around her neighborhood in Ithaca, New York

front step. . .
this snail delivering
a plum blossom

cherry blossom moon
my home becomes
a palace

graduation day
after the hands land
wondering what to do

Lauren Krauze writes short stories, short poems and long emails. She currently teaches and lives in New York, NY.

Repairs of the Week

That week you didn’t call
I was quite busy
plastering myself together
Shoring up the beams
Repairing the glass of an ego
That didn’t withstand the storm.
I swept up the gravel from
A rock hard heart
that remained unflinching
until now.
How unfair to the structure
To shake its foundation so.
How unfair to upend me so.
How unfair…

10 tips on writing a poem

1. Mention things by genus (which crows do you hear screaming like fog horns; which tuber in your garden is making your nose smile?).
2. Describe something as something else (the sun stings like battery acid).
3. It is helpful to mention vast expanses of hilly land with some wind slapping your hair around. Or conversely, the grittiness of your street, the dirt under your nails.
4. Bring in a few details like sights and/or tastes, but remember to describe them as something else (your hair tastes like fury).
5. Stop… Hold time in your palm. Look at it with the precision of a second-hand. Notice your smallness in the world. Or contemplate the vastness of the Milky Way.
6. What do you feel (remember… feel it as something else [your hands, like autumn kisses])? Notice and recount the details.
7. Reveal something so secret it makes others uncomfortable, and so big your priest is repenting from association.
8. Rhyme sparingly and with care. Same with alliteration.
9. Juxtaposition works well at the end.
10. Place your heart on your sleeve and send it off, then wait and wait and wait. Repeat…

Jeri Thompson resides in Long Beach, CA where she spends much quality time with herself and her Trikke (Scarlett Birdie) riding along the beach bike/Trikke path. Nominated for a Pushcart Prize in 2014, she is soon to appear in Pearl Magazine. Also find her in Silver, Green and Summer Anthologies from Silver Birch Press, and online at Cadence Collective, Bukowski on Wry, Cactifur and Carnival Literature Magazine (Vol. 4). CSULB grad, studied with professors G. Locklin, E. Fried, R. Lee and R. Zapeda. LBC resident since 1993.

the potato seeds begin to sprout space station

The Force

(After Dylan Thomas)

This tiny, nondescript, lavender flower,
growing in a crack in the sidewalk–

a divine explosion of cells–

has a power greater
than that of two spiral galaxies colliding
in space–

and you
share in that power.

George Young is a retired physician living in Boulder, Colorado, USA. He has published four books of poetry and has recently become engrossed in writing short, eight-lined poems.

her bookmark
divides The Art of Love —
living apart

moving day …
in her throwaway pile
my first chapbook

snow angel —
the touch of her lips
cold in my memory

Chen-ou Liu is currently the editor and translator of NeverEnding Story, http://neverendingstoryhaikutanka.blogspot.ca/, and the author of five books, including Following the Moon to the Maple Land (First Prize, 2011 Haiku Pix Chapbook Contest) and A Life in Transition and Translation ( Honorable Mention, 2014Turtle Light Press Biennial Haiku Chapbook Competition).

Joann Grisetti writes poetry and short stories. She lives in Florida with her husband and two sons. Joann loves travel and reading.

delicate
in her spring dress
of purple…
oh my, myrtle I say
where is this frock in winter?

Pat Geyer lives in East Brunswick, NJ, USA. Her home is surrounded by the parks and lakes where she finds her inspiration in Nature. Published in several journals, she is an amateur photographer and poet.

they look like snowflakes…
pear tree blossoms falling
past my window

Ed Bremson is retired, but he hopes he never retires from being a poet, just as he hopes he never fails to enjoy the pleasures of Spring.

Barbara Kaufmann can be found (or lost) wandering in the woods, beaches and gardens of New York, her camera and notebook in hand, hunting for poems.http://wabisabipoet.wordpress.com/

each story
sparks to the surface
in spurts
most of the time
I’m just living

Kat Lehmann (@SongsOfKat) lives in Connecticut, USA by the river where she writes. Her first book of free verse poetry, Moon Full of Moons (Peaceful Daily, 2015), was published in February 2015 http://peacefuldaily.com/page/books.

hedgerow #22

Posted on March 27, 2015 by Caroline Skanne

welcome to hedgerow #22, featuring eleven different poets and artists. the next issue will be dedicated to spring flowers. send in your your work in time! and, if you haven’t done so already, please have peek at the links below.

with love & kindness…

https://www.facebook.com/wildflowerpoetrypress

https://www.facebook.com/hedgerowpoems

Cardinal and I
eat sour cherries off the backyard tree
at dusk.
“you’re molting”, I say.
and he tells me how he can change
become even brighter
while staying completely true
to his very
nature.

Stacey Crawford Murphy is happiest when her thoughts are clear, short and haiku shaped, but living in Ithaca, NY helps too.

Carole Johnston lives in Lexington, Kentucky USA where she drives around Bluegrass backroads with a notebook and camera in the front seat, capturing the haiku moment. Journeys: Getting Lost, Carole’s first chapbook of haiku and tanka, is now available for presale from Finishing Line Press.
https://finishinglinepress.com/product_info.php?products_id=2211

winter’s end
hearing the stream
sing again

back from the vets
opening the car boot
to silence

Rachel Sutcliffe, from Yorkshire, UK, has suffered from a serious immune disorder for the past 14 years, throughout this time writing has been her therapy, it keeps her from going insane!

“Fresh ink?”
“Yeah, the souvenir of my trip,” the youth said,
  with a shy smile.
“Very nice, truly cool.” I meant it
   (although tattoos are not my thing).
Yet both of us have been ritually marked
  –whether obvious or not,
  by experiences in
the land of the Maori.

A pharmacist by profession, a haiku poet by nature, Nancy Brady reads and writes, living on the coast of Lake Erie in Huron, Ohio.

mid-fight
our dog
sighs

in the steam
on the window
a freshly-drawn sun
drips

Lauren Krauze writes short stories, short poems and long emails. She currently teaches and lives in New York, NY. Discover more of Lauren’s writing at http://www.laurenkrauze.com.

insomnia —
trying to read
grandmother’s bible
in a foreign tongue

Julie Bloss Kelsey’s favorite thing about spring is the emergence of frogs, especially the spring peepers that frequent her back yard. @MamaJoules on Twitter

The Color of Night

Behind the closed doors of my childhood
I have lived my life.
In my room, a separate
Compartment of safety and solitude
From a stormy combination of chemicals,
A bubbling brew called “father.”
Struggling against the rip
Drowning in his tides of darkness,
I fought to stay afloat
Learning comfort comes from solitude.

I walk away too easily, tossing people in my wake,
“It is less trouble to be alone” I repeat.
I fill my days with events and errands,
My nights with marijuana and TV shows I’ve already seen
Attempting to fill an empty space, a birthing place,
A universe filled with my father’s indifference.
I crave what I have no roadmap for
And I search without knowing north.
Am I lost if I don’t know my terrain?

Loneliness is just a frame of mind
A filter to look through
A decision made unconsciously
A badge, a lost battle.
It doesn’t need to define my daylight,
Because it colors my night.

Exsanguination

When he said, “You shine so bright. I am lucky to know you.”
I believed him.
When he said, “You make me want to be a better man,”
I believed that, too.

Then he continued to date
Other women. He liked to talk about them… and
How much better, smarter, prettier, sexier I was,
(Soon I will be the chosen one, I thought).

While I have never received a fist in the face like her,
I am still my mother’s daughter.
I can take a squared off punch in the gut like a heavyweight,
Expecting it to be the last. It never is.

Then, the tipping point…
That place where I stand upright again, finally.
There is no rush of blood to my head.
Only the anemic dizziness of a woman
All bled out.

a sea of blue uniforms
under the New York sun
a black man
holding up a placard
that reads I can’t breathe

Enlightenment

is not a state, it’s a winged thing.

Swimming in our ocean, gasping for breath,
battered by waves,

we do occasionally

look up,
see the blue sky, feel the sun on our faces,

glimpse it for a moment–
serene, flying.

George Young is a retired physician living in Boulder, Colorado, USA. He has published four books of poetry and has recently become engrossed in writing short, eight-lined poems.

Debbie Strange (Canada) is a published tanka and haiku poet and an avid photographer. She enjoys creating haiga and tanshi (small poem) art. You are invited to see more of her work on Twitter @Debbie_Strange.

turtle path she found her way home

hedgerow #21

Posted on March 20, 2015 by Caroline Skanne

welcome to #21 of hedgerow, dedicated more or less, to the arrival of spring! for those of you in the southern hemisphere, wishing you a happy autumn equinox. always grateful for all of your support, contributors & readers alike, you make this a beautiful place.

with love & kindness…

crossroads —
a cloud
covers Polaris

Julie Warther lives in Dover, Ohio and serves as Midwest Regional Coordinator for the Haiku Society of America. (www.hsa-haiku.org)

Barbara Kaufmann can be found (or lost) wandering in the woods, beaches and gardens of New York, her camera and notebook in hand, hunting for poems.http://wabisabipoet.wordpress.com/

celebrating
seven inches of melting snow …
the frog choir

midday snooze …
the old dog stretches
toward a patch of sun

Julie Bloss Kelsey’s favorite thing about spring is the emergence of frogs, especially the spring peepers that frequent her back yard. @MamaJoules on Twitter

For Luck

The scarf she gave me is rather shocking. Orange, red, light blue, dark blue, shades of green. But not a smidgen of brown and the absence of purple is nearly palpable. More to the point: where is the black? Nothing I own, or have ever owned, has been this colorful. It’s alarming. But also, strangely magnetic.

I wear the scarf when I’m alone in the apartment, waiting for water to boil, or squinting over a book in the fading afternoon light. I don’t have the courage or the humor to wear it in front of anyone else. It wraps twice around my neck, is soft against my cheeks, and when I inhale I’m brought right back to that childhood bedroom at the end of the long, dark hallway. Did I have a baby blanket that felt like this?

for luck —
a red thread
hangs from the crib

Zee Zahava lives in Ithaca, New York, where she leads weekly Writing Circles in her downtown studio. She is the editor of brass bell, an online haiku journal:http://brassbellhaiku.blogspot.com

Robin White is an artisan, gardener & beekeeper living in Deerfield, New Hampshire, USA. She is the face behind Wild Graces and a co-founding editor of Akitsu Quarterly, a haiku journal.

winter wind …
letting go of myself
in the sand

at the cliff’s edge
I wait
for the cold moon

Chen-ou Liu is currently the editor and translator of NeverEnding Story, http://neverendingstoryhaikutanka.blogspot.ca/, and the author of five books, including Following the Moon to the Maple Land (First Prize, 2011 Haiku Pix Chapbook Contest) and A Life in Transition and Translation (Honorable Mention, 2014Turtle Light Press Biennial Haiku Chapbook Competition).

last leaf
goldfinch alights
the stripped branch

Lizz Murphy was born in Ireland but has lived in rural Australia for a long time. She has published twelve books and is currently fixated on small poems.

Joann Grisetti lived up in Sasebo Japan and eighteen other places. She now lives in Florida with her husband and two sons. Her poetry, photos and stories have appeared in a number of print and online journals. She is still waiting to grow up.

Process

every morning before a mirror
you make-up like you were building
the world all over again on your face

do you not know that time
is a metaphor— for something that moves
deep and fast like fire on the mound of a wax

don’t you know that time is the same as death
even if it’s just a profusion of the process of dying
and living again

Saddiq Dzukogi is a Nigerian poet. He writes from the Capital city of Minna

hedgerow #20

Posted on March 13, 2015 by Caroline Skanne

welcome to #20 of hedgerow, bringing you nine different poets & artists. this will be the last winter issue, next week we’ll celebrate the spring equinox! send in your work in time. thanks for all your support, every effort is appreciated. happy friday everyone.

with love & kindness…

Snow / No Hummingbirds

Finally, the refrigerator motor shuts off and the loudest sound is one I make myself by circling my thumbs around each other. I don’t realize I’m doing this until I try to identify the sound and, by the process of elimination — since there are no hummingbirds in the apartment, no rustling leaves — I figure it out.

It’s been snowing all day. The last car went by hours ago and the tire tracks are filled in. Only two people pass, a man and a woman, walking down the middle of the street instead of on the sidewalk. I watch from the window: the woman, in a pale trench coat and high leather boots, holds a black umbrella over her head; the man wears a hooded jacket and lumbers beside her. They pass my house, then the fire station’s parking lot, the pretty house with the stained glass windows, the health club, and the abandoned storefront. They don’t appear to be talking to each other but I can’t be sure.

I go back to my chair, and the novel I don’t yet care about, and realize too late that I should have changed into warmer socks. I am too lazy to get up again. The refrigerator has started to hum again and the fire department’s generator just kicked in.

hour after hour
at the window —
yes it is still snowing

Zee Zahava lives in Ithaca, New York, where she leads weekly Writing Circles in her downtown studio. She is the editor of brass bell, an online haiku journal: http://brassbellhaiku.blogspot.com

trying to
clear a path from
the past
yesterday’s snow
heavy in his shovel

watching
for her return
another
snowflake melts
on my window

Dave Read is a Canadian poet whose work has appeared in many journals, including hedgerow. You can find his micropoetry on Twitter, @AsSlimAsImBeing.

lost behind
tree silhouettes
a fallen star

on the edge of
a snowdrop
rainbows

Vibeke Laier lives in Randers, Denmark, she has been writing and studying poetry since 2012, but her interest in the art of haiku stretches back to when she was a schoolgirl.

winter
a neon dream journey
nowhere zen road

Carole Johnston lives in Lexington, Kentucky USA where she drives around Bluegrass backroads with a notebook and camera in the front seat, capturing the haiku moment. Journeys: Getting Lost, Carole’s first chapbook of haiku and tanka, is now available for presale from Finishing Line Press. https://finishinglinepress.com/product_info.php?products_id=2211

Granddad in waiting

Directed at the nirvana
whoosh…
a single digit
climbs the clouds
beyond the reach of the streetlights
trailing off into silence

Flash— Bang,

Out of this disappearing point of light
Cascades golden rain
a murmur of a pop
adds silver splashes—
fracturing stars
slowly fading—
crackling to out.

Hello?

More glittering Fingers—
racing skyward,
music?
Tchaikovsky 1812.
woven in with

Hello?

Shrieks whistles
blues and Reds
greens and yellows
hissing, screaming
bangs and ka-booms
a climax of illumination and
reverberation.

On your marks!

HELLO are you still there?
Do what lov’—

Set!

sorry—
I didn’t hear you

Go…
my heart starts the race,

Callum and Blake are here
you know, the twins
hello!
Yeah! Yeah! I hear you,

Finding it hard going
my heart
hammering on
the final lap

are they all ok?
mother and babies doing fine

pressing the tape—
crossing the finish line,
winner

lovely what weight—
hello! hello! what,
she’s gone—
I also hang up

after a pounding race
warming down
relief and joy
overwhelmed
I weep.

My first born—
that poor girl
pregnant; huge and
uncomfortable
feeling ugly
for the last few weeks.

My eyes swim as
reality floods
ya-hooooooooo
I’m a granddad
whoosh…
cue music…

Mike Keville from London AKA Mikeymike.

BACKLIT

She treads the shoulder
Hesitates
Her silhouette
fine-lettering limbs
serif paws
Her glance to the sun’s blaze
her swivel on one hind leg
her felicitous leave
The saving of her own fox self

Lizz Murphy was born in Ireland but has lived in rural Australia for a long time. She has published twelve books and is currently fixated on small poems.

winter reaching the middle of the pond

geese overhead
the one that fills the spaces
between honks

Julie Warther lives in Dover, Ohio and serves as Midwest Regional Coordinator for the Haiku Society of America. (www.hsa-haiku.org)

subsiding gently into a hillside
a house I used to know

Molly Guy is Australian. She has had six books published, most of these contain collections of micro poetry and short stories.

Sandi Pray is a wild child who roams between mountain and marsh in North Carolina and Florida, http://ravencliffs.blogspot.com.

hedgerow #19

Posted on March 6, 2015 by Caroline Skanne

welcome to #19 hedgerow, bringing you ten different poets & artists, including for the first time some very short fiction! thank you all for turning up. it is a beautiful thing…

if you haven’t yet passed by our sister site wildflower poetry press — https://wildflowerpoetrypress.wordpress.com/

with love & kindness

The Journey Itself Is Home
for Matsuo Basho

I carry the dead weight
of cliched poetry
on the road
to the Interior
cherry blossoms drifting

Like the shadow in the morning, the workshop lecturer’s comment lingers in my mind, “There are two kinds of traveler-poets: those who look at the map and those who look in the mirror. The first are embarking on their journey, and the latter are returning home.”

Debbie Strange is a published tanka and haiku poet and an avid photographer. She enjoys creating haiga and tanshi (small poem) art. You are invited to visit her on Twitter @Debbie_Strange.

out at sea
with no wind in my sails…
the hardest
place to be
is by your side

Sergio A. Ortiz, Editor http://undertowtankareview.blogspot.com/

reunion …
sailing in every puddle
thunder clouds

Archana Kapoor Nagpal is an internationally published author of four books and three anthologies. Presently, she resides in Bangalore, India. You can visit her Amazon Author Profile to know more about her books and literary contributions.

The 365th Day

This is the day we do that summing up.
Annoying, isn’t it, the way
we tally and sort the year’s days
into the things – or people – we like and those
that caused us pain? We inventory
and discard, if we’re smart, whatever
no longer works, or what
carries no joy. We have this need
to take stock, as though we
were running a giant store full of
stuff, boots and gloves, or jars
of face cream and scented soaps.

This year let’s
let it alone,
think instead of the faint yellow blush
on the forsythia. Soon we can snip
its branches, hammer the stems
against the stone walk, set it all
in warm water in an old jar.

The small blooms, and then
tender green leaves will unfold
in the corner window.
Forcing spring
in midwinter.

Lynne Viti teaches writing about law, technology and media at Wellesley College in Massachusetts. She has written and published on such disparate topics as law, television, gardening, fashion, and growing up in Baltimore. See her links to publications on her blog: stillinschool.wordpress.com.

pencil pine–
letters you wrote
to the moon

Robyn Cairns is a Melbourne based poet who shares her poetry and photography on twitter @robbiepoet.

Steve Wilkinson, Co.Durham, England. Editor of the Bamboo Hut and currently exploring the avenue of TanshiArt.

Strangers

I sit on the front steps waiting for my ride. I have to be careful not to get into the wrong car. Strangers pull up in front of my house all the time and I jump up and greet them like long-lost friends. Sometimes this scares them and sometimes it scares me. I’m always having to explain about being nearsighted.

Familiar

Once in a restaurant I waved to myself in the mirror because I looked so familiar. I was critical of my haircut but other than that I looked like someone I might like to know. I gave myself a friendly smile, along with the wave. This could have been embarrassing but luckily nobody else noticed.

Excited

In the dream my friend tells me she is studying “Berlitz” and I get all excited, thinking she said “burlesque.”

Zee Zahava lives in Ithaca, New York, where she leads weekly Writing Circles in her downtown studio. She is the editor of brass bell, an online haiku journal: http://brassbellhaiku.blogspot.com

lemon gin
the sun sets
earlier today

winter winds
he still makes her
blush

Dave Read is a Canadian poet whose work has appeared in many journals, including hedgerow. You can find his micropoetry on Twitter @AsSlimAsImBeing.

Veronika Zora Novak is simply a daydreamer.

hedgerow #17

Posted on February 20, 2015 by Caroline Skanne

welcome to #17 of hedgerow, bringing you ten different poets & artists. as always grateful to readers & contributors alike. please keep sending in your work as well as spreading the word, every effort really counts! thanks also to all of you who had a peek at our sister site wildflower poetry press. if you haven’t already, simply follow the links below —

https://wildflowerpoetrypress.wordpress.com/

https://www.facebook.com/wildflowerpoetrypress

with love & kindness…

Michael Curtis Paul

Here at the Museum of Bad Ideas

We climb the spiral staircase
With boundless enthusiasm, searching
Tirelessly for the co-relation
Of spit and sandpaper, Jackdaw and superstition.
My wife is singing ‘Mary had a little lamb.’
My wife is reciting multiplication tables.
Once she quoted Tennyson:
“There lies the port, the vessel puffs her sail.”
I reached for a bottle of port, and downed it.
We are ailing from the same ailments, but approach
Remedies from different directions.
She prepares to ingest certain curative
Substances, while I make an appointment
With the headshrinker and wait patiently
For the vessel to puff her sail.

All of this. All of that. All of the above.
A sort of summing up. A remedial mathematics of memory.

Walking a high wire strung between the Urban Dictionary and the Oxford Unabridged, Michael Curtis Paul is a tight rope aerialist with an inner ear disease.

Paula Dawn Lietz

Paula Dawn Lietz ( Pd Lietz ) is an accomplished multi-genre artist, photographer and poet. http://www.pdlietzphotography.com

Debbie Strange

The Sacrament of Snow

the glow
of candled sea ice
at sundown
snowflakes melting
on our lashes

moonswept
the snowy foothills
u n d u l a t e
a night bird calls
my echo answers

a nimbus
around the frost moon
above us
the hushed wings
of a snowy owl

so many words
for rain and snow
in foreign tongues
yet the language of lovers
remains the same

Debbie Strange is a published tanka and haiku poet and an avid photographer. She enjoys creating haiga and tanshi (small poem) art. You are invited to visit her on Twitter @Debbie_Strange.

Natalia L. Rudychev

the phoenix of my heart
leaves fireflies behind
like fairy tale crumbs
so if i’m ever lost
there would be
living sparks
to guide
your
path
to
me

Natalia L. Rudychev is a philosopher, dancer, poet. She lives in New York, New York.

Caroline Skanne

Caroline Skanne, Rochester, UK is obsessed with anything wild and free. She is the founder of hedgerow: a journal of small poems. Her book ‘a hundred poems by caroline skanne’ is available from amazon: http://www.amazon.co.uk/hundred-small-poems-caroline-skanne/dp/1506022944

Barbara Kaufmann

How Is It Possible

on a morning when the clouds
curl back upon themselves,
and give up only momentary corridors of bare sky,
on a morning when those maddeningly small tokens of blue
taunt and tease a rain-weary, fog-weary heart,
how is it that the sighing wind,
bending toward the naked oak tree,
can carry a burst of bird song
through the myriad layers
of a morose winter morning,
piercing the frozen edges of a february nap
prodding and poking me out of my february nest?

By what miracle does a Carolina wren,
the tiniest of wintering birds,
on the gloomiest of winter days,
sing in the only voice
the universe gave it,
an April voice,
conjuring up a stunning moment of spring,
and bestowing a blessing
on the rain besotted morning,
anointing my eyes and ears
with the chrism of its winter anthem,
just in time to save my despairing soul
from the depths of this winter silence?

Barbara Kaufmann can be found (or lost) wandering in the woods, beaches and gardens of New York, her camera and notebook in hand, hunting for poems. http://wabisabipoet.wordpress.com/

Wendy Bourke

We walked by bushes in the rose garden
– happy – munching on kalamata olives and
spitting out pits, that landed, capriciously,
on the earth – like peace-loving bullets.

I rested my head upon his shoulder
and listened to the sound of our breathing . . .
as the minutes fell away.

Wendy Bourke lives in Vancouver, BC where – after a life loving words and scribbling poetry lines on pizza boxes and used envelopes – she finally got down to writing and publishing her poetry “in earnest” four years ago.

David J Kelly

David J Kelly lives and works in Dublin, Ireland, where he finds scientific and artistic inspiration in the natural world.

Ed Bremson

the unstained snowy
mountain-top . . .
the pine woods,
the eagle soaring
amidst the clouds

Ed Bremson lives in Raleigh, NC, USA where he writes poetry, watches movies, erases novels, and makes haiku song videos. ‘the unstained snowy’ appears in Ed Bremson’s book of found poems Frankenstein, available at amazon — http://www.amazon.com/Frankenstein-Ed-Bremson/dp/1503116794/ref=sr_1_1

Veronika Zora Novak

on bent knees . . .
our hair washed by
twilit river song

Veronika Zora Novak is simply a daydreamer.

hedgerow #13

Posted on January 23, 2015 by Caroline Skanne

welcome back to hedgerow! the first issue of 2015 brings you 16 different poets & artists. as always, grateful to contributors & readers alike, please keep sending in your work as well as spreading the word, every effort really counts!

with love & kindness…

Pamela A. Babusci

Pamela A. Babusci is an internationally award-winning haiku/tanka & haiga artist. She lives in Rochester, NY, USA.

Stacey Murphy

Shoveling

what if
while shoveling tonight,
I stop
just for a moment
cease the stooping, stabbing, groaning and lifting

turn my face skyward
close my eyes
hear the wind
as my shoulders relax
the handle slack in my unclenched hands

my ghost age 6
rides in on that wind
whispers, giggles
the gust of cold –
breathless
like the moment
at the end of a wicked sled run

flakes collecting
on my eyelids
like they did when
I finished making snow angels
just lying there, collecting them

like wishes
like potential
icy absolution
melting away
all flaws
all complaints
all guilts, real or imagined

we are clean in this frosty night
new in the world
once again.

Stacey Murphy is happiest when her thoughts are clear, short and haiku shaped, but living in Ithaca, NY helps too.

Chase Gagnon

safe inside a box
the christmas bulbs
from our shattered family

reaching for the wind…
in another life
I was a willow

perched on my lap
she tells me the owl
is her spirit animal

Chase Gagnon is a student from Detroit, who loves staying up all night drinking coffee and writing poetry. His poems have appeared in a number of journals and anthologies over the past two years.

Lizz Murphy

in my arms
a wounded eagle or
a half-waking moment

some are quiet about it
a wren barely bending the stem
a blackbird changing shadows

Lizz Murphy has published twelve books. Her seven poetry titles includePortraits: 54 Poems and Six Hundred Dollars (PressPress), Walk the Wildly(Picaro Press), Stop Your Cryin (Island Press) and Two Lips Went Shopping(Spinifex Press print and e-book). Her next title Shebird is forthcoming (PressPress). Lizz has been a featured poet in festivals and programs from the Illawarra to Darwin and Launceston. She is available for workshops and mentoring etc.

David J Kelly

David J Kelly lives and works in Dublin, Ireland, where he finds scientific and artistic inspiration in the natural world.

Zee Zahava

white butterflies at the window —
snowy morning —
my nearsightedness

another orchid blossom falls my grey hairs also shedding

I didn’t want to care so much but then I did — little ant

bowing to the setting sun my shadow walks into the sea

these long winter evenings
we listen to the moon
we listen to the stars
we listen to the beat
of our own hearts

Zee Zahava lives in Ithaca, N.Y. She writes most of her poems in a small notebook while taking her early morning walks. She is the editor of brass bell, an online haiku journal: http://brassbellhaiku.blogspot.com/

Archana Kapoor Nagpal

walking uphill …
one by one my steps
before my shadow

Mike Keville

bad temper
even my shadow and I
are not talking

family tree
the seed that fell
further away

Mike Keville from London AKA Mikeymike.

William C. Patterson

Leaf Smoke, Sun Streak

Not until this moment,
the sky impossibly coral streaked
& filled in by downy cloud,
did I accept the end of another year.

Some of what goes up does not come back the same:
the leaf that fell now rises as smoke,
its rustle now crackles,
its color now roasts,
& its rust smells of cherry, oak, & smoky peat.

soon, I know, the cold rains will come,
the leaves’ revenge, the end of fire,
the long sleep of seed & soil,
until the green fuse lit:
pop of bloom, crack of ice, hum of bird return.

but now, this evening that holds the cold away at a flames length,
a sky beholden not to art,
there is no sense in holding on to the past,
just being here now, just seeing & smelling
the end of another season is enough to settle this month’s doubts.

William C. Patterson lives, teaches, and writes in northeast Kansas. The poems come from his life with his family, his life teaching literature and composition, and the daily commute between these two lives.

Julie Warther & Meik Blottenberger

Julie Warther – Dover, Ohio (words)
Meik Blottenberger – Hanover, Pa (photograph)
Julie and Meik both came from other forms of writing to haiku. Now, they collaborate and support each other in their haiku habits.

Nells Wasilewski

five days of mourning
broken by
a cardinal’s song

Nells Wasilewski lives in the United States where she retired from the mortgage industry in 2011, and began pursing her lifelong dream of writing; she has had her work published in several Journals, magazines and books.

Janet Qually

foster children
start writing winter poems
will hearts be touched?
outside
wanting in

Janet Qually (USA) has been published in several journals and enjoys writing all forms of poetry. She frequently creates computer graphics to illustrate her work.

Alexis Rotella

I tuck in my dolls
tell them
not to be scared
Mom and Dad
at it again.

As close as I can get
to my dead mother
her friend
who misses her
every day.

Sleek black crow
like a drone
it glides over
a farmer’s
fallow field

Paula Dawn Lietz

Tangled

tangled and sticky thick web drags
like a forgotten anchor pulling

me deep into murky depths
of shallow

forces of the current bend

the willow straining
I panic it will break
will I

break
I hold on
fearful in
my grasp
knowing
if I let go
I
will
d
   r
     o
       w
          n

Paula Dawn Lietz ( Pd Lietz ) is an accomplished multi-genre artist, photographer and poet. http://www.pdlietzphotography.com

Jon Wynne

Tears

Tears are just a way
To wash the dust from your dreams
Dry them carefully. Look!
See how they sparkle in the Sun

Jon Wynne lives in Hampshire and has been writing on & off for many years. People and places are the real poetry. ‘I just try to describe what I see and feel.’

Julie Bloss Kelsey

driving home
under the inquisitive gaze
of a spotted fawn

despite the clouds
I still believe …
rose moon

cirrus at sunset —
a line of fire rainbows
ignite the ocean

Julie Bloss Kelsey (@MamaJoules on Twitter) just earned her certification as a Maryland Master Naturalist.

hedgerow #8

Posted on November 14, 2014 by Caroline Skanne

welcome to #8 and two months of hedgerow! let’s celebrate with the news that there is a print issue in the pipeline. also, have a peek at our newly launched sister site wildflower poetry press http://wildflowerpoetrypress.wordpress.com thanks for all your support in making our small poems grow! with love & kindness…

Sandi Pray

Sandi Pray is a wild child who roams between mountain and marsh in North Carolina and Florida, http://ravencliffs.blogspot.com.

Rena Lindgren

at dawn I wash my face in sunlight

Rena Lindgren, Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA enjoys singing, reading and writing poetry.

Angelee Deodhar

night train
trailing white exhaust
across the moon

Angelee Deodhar is an eye surgeon by profession. She is also a haiku poet, translator and artist from India. Her haiku/haiga has been published internationally in various books, journals and on the internet.

David Ishaya Osu

full moon
i remember all tales
of mama
heaven was in
our village

David Ishaya Osu is a Nigerian poet and a street photography enthusiast. He believes in hedonism, and says his role is ‘Air’. He is just obsessed with living.

Zee Zahava

Still Arm-In-Arm

linking elbows in a town that is not ours
I ask Is this okay?
you pull my arm closer to your body

Where can I get a really good cookie?
you ask
your lips brushing against my ear

4 strangers (older than we are)
squeeze by on a narrow strip of sidewalk

we are anonymous here

I suggest the bakery we’ve been to before
But if that doesn’t work out
I tell you
I know another place

we like to return to the familiar
but also (or so we tell ourselves)
we are open to the unexpected

we arrive
still arm-in-arm
at the bakery we know

they have exactly the kind of cookie you are craving

But next time we’re here
you say
We could try the other bakery

Robyn Cairns

she lay on the warm pier looking skyward and dreamt

Robyn Cairns is a Melbourne based poet who shares her poetry and photography on twitter @robbiepoet.

Mary Hohlman

Mary Hohlman, USA, is a mother, writer, student, and athlete. She enjoys writing Japanese and short verse poetry. She finds daily inspiration outdoors at her home in Northern California and spending time with her 4 year old daughter. http://www.poetrypretty.wordpress.com http://www.maryhohlman.com/

Sarah Thursday

Fixing a Hole

How do you fill
                       a chasm?
With stone or wood
               or earth?
An artist doesn’t fill
                       a chasm
but instead creates
          an amphitheater
and floods the space
    with song
Steep gouged walls
become a torso
     its beating heart
          begins to sing

Sarah Thursday is a music obsessed, poetry advocate and documents her antics on http://www.SarahThursday.com

Tim Gardiner

the caterpillar
hangs by a single thread
hostage to the wind –
I face the loneliness
of another winter

Tim Gardiner is a professional ecologist who has written scientific papers, natural history books and poetry which has been published in literary journals such as Blithe Spirit and Frogpond.

Tobi Cogswell

Look up—
Not to the oceans of clouds,
or the moss dripping fragrant
with the turn of season.
Not to a place inside
that furrows your brow,
one side of your lip folded
across your teeth. Not to
photos, memories,
dreams of ancients
once smiling, now dead.
Not to the sound of coffee,
or smell of melodies
golden and gorgeous,
and beckoning.
Not to the clock ticking,
or the sound of the
far-off train, so distant
it could be mistaken for thunder.
Not to the dirty pennies
jingling in the jar.
Look at me.
I am…

Tobi Cogswell lives in Torrance, CA. She is the co-editor and co-publisher of San Pedro River Review (www.sprreview.com). Her seventh chapbook, “The Coincidence of Castles”, is forthcoming from Glass Lyre Press. You can reach Tobi at editor@sprreview.com.

Jamie Wimberly

I heard your murmurs,
You, drunken streets of Dublin,
I heard and awoke.

Jamie Wimberly has been writing haiku for many years with some success, including publication and awards. Recently, Jamie has been publishing haiku everyday on Twitter (@haiku_america).

Carole Johnston

where do the homeless
go when it rains?
broken winged butterfly

Carole Johnston lives in Lexington, Kentucky USA where she drives around Bluegrass backroads with a notebook and camera in the front seat, capturing the haiku moment. Journeys:Getting Lost, Carole’s first chapbook of haiku and tanka, is now available for presale from Finishing Line Press. The books will be delivered in January. https://finishinglinepress.com/product_info.php?products_id=2211

S.M. Abeles

when the wind
blows the whole sky
blue
the cool way
you look at me

S.M. Abeles is just a simple poet.

Helen Buckingham

Royal Swans
circle the moat…
how little they know

Helen Buckingham has been writing ku for the past couple of decades in Bristol, and has recently moved to Wells, the smallest cathedral city in England, deep in the heart of Somerset.

Matsukaze

when they called me
“creole n*****!”
ran into grandma’s arms
she brushed tears aside
giving me a sweet dough lemon tart
*
nothing really needs to be said
to my right, the vivid blue of hydrangea this autumn

Matsukaze, has been writing tanka for the last 10 years. He is featured in Atlas Poetica, and the Tanka Kajin Club Magazine. He is the founder of the Chocolate Cosmos Tanka Study Group @CCosmosTankaSC on twitter.

Michael Tolleson

Lament

Michael Tolleson, Seattle, Washington, is an Autistic Savant Artist, who has no formal art training, but instead relies on the use of the huge amount of stored information that his Asperger’s mind has observed and retained. During his career of only 3 years of painting, he has painted more than 600 paintings, and each painting is usually completed in less than one hour of painting time regardless of size. He states that he feels trance-like during the actual act of painting, and is reluctant to take credit for the finished work as he feels the autism is actually the artist. http://www.MichaelTollesonArtist.com

hedgerow #2

Posted on October 3, 2014 by Caroline Skanne

excited to bring you the second issue of hedgerow, featuring 13 different poets and artists. a warm thank you to all contributors & readers! comments, likes & shares are welcomed, as are your submissions for upcoming issues. with love & kindness, enjoy…

Joanne Rose

and then
he heard the moon say
there’s a beautiful earth
in the sky tonight

Joanne Rose lives in the USA and loves to scribble poems and pictures in the sand. http://forallmywalking.blogspot.com

Vibeke Laier

moonlight
the way the body
changes to silk

creasing
the origami paper
unfolding wish

evening stillness
how deep the space
between words

filling the heart
day after day
white butterflies

Vibeke Laier lives in Randers, Denmark, she has been writing and studying poetry since 2012, but her interest in the art of haiku stretches back to when she was a schoolgirl.

Roary Williams

letting go
I breathe with the crickets
until stars appear

down from the roof
and across the fence
the moon and the
neighbor’s cat
headed home

out on a limb
chest puffed out
singing to anyone
who would listen
the chickadee and I

even before
I was born
my heart pulsing
to the rhythm
of rain

two swallows
detach from the train
then veer off the tracks

Roary Williams, Albuquerque New Mexico, USA, is a simple poet who loves nature and the seasons (@CoyoteSings)

Sandi Pray

Sandi Pray is a wild child who roams between mountain and marsh in North Carolina and Florida, http://ravencliffs.blogspot.com.

Christine L. Villa

eternally lost
in a garden maze
I search for you
in places I need you
most

will I ever be loved
the same way as before
the willow hedges
of where we’ve been
still longs for you

entrenched
in my lonely heart
memories
like dandelions
full of wishes

before the day ends
counting morning glories
I have to accept
my life the way it is
without you

Aside from being a children’s book author and a poet, Christine L. Villa is also the editor of Frameless Sky – a video journal showcasing poets, artists, and musicians in collaborative projects http://framelesssky.weebly.com.

Laura Williams

our small act
between the sheets …
ecstatic motion
what does it mean to become
one with the universe?

autumn migration
crossing the afterlife
on butterfly wings

moon viewing …
the luna moth and I
simpatico

a short break
from stacking the woodpile
before the first storm
the sharp wind
cuts right through us

Laura Williams has been writing haiku and tanka since 2012. She lives in California, USA. http://www.foralovelything.blogspot.com

Alexis Rotella

Zee Zahava

I could hold a pencil for a year
and not find
the poem of you

the way a mountain moves —
that’s what I mean
by slow kissing

dear moon
I forgot to look at you last night
did you see me?

Zee Zahava lives in Ithaca, N.Y. she writes most of her poems in a small notebook while taking her early morning walks, she is the editor of brass bell, an online haiku journal: http://brassbellhaiku.blogspot.com/

Safiyyah Patel

Moment

eloquent silence
descended upon the garden
after a furious downpour…
skies opened up
to reveal a sapphire expanse
captured by a pixelled shot…
it reminded her of the moment
when nature washed her
to the bone…
dark clouds stripped
into muddy rivulets…

Safiyyah Patel lives in England, UK, and is passionate about writing and counselling.

Traci Siler

Nesting
in the soft fold
of my breasts
the sweet scent
of spring

Traci Siler is a wife, mother, poet and West Nile survivor from Carrollton, Texas whose work has appeared in numerous poetry journals and in her recently released book, Beneath A Morphine Moon, available on amazon.com and her paintings can be viewed on her art page on Facebook.

Sergio A. Ortiz

I want to die
rolling in the arms
of a cello player
naked to the waist
rolling in my sweet baby’s arms

how can I forget
those tremulous hours
where we bathed
in each other’s arms
water on water

Sergio A. Ortiz is the founding editor of Undertow Tanka Review, he lives in San Juan Puerto Rico and is a four-time nominee for the 2010-2011 Sundress Best of the Web Anthology, and a two-time 2010 Pushcart nominee.

S.M. Abeles

S.M. Abeles is just a simple poet.