Featured Poet – John Hawkhead
summer thunderstorm
filling air with tension
she crosses her thighs
dad and I
opening up
about our mothers
buffeting wind
a child blowing bubbles
from her wounds
gathering storm
we hunker down
in belief systems
there it is again
that harvest moon in the well
of my whisky glass
John Hawkhead is a writer from the South West of England who has published haiku, senryū and haiga all over the world. His book Bone Moon placed third in the 2023 Haiku Society of America Merit Book Awards and follows his 2016 publication Small Shadows – both from Alba Publishing. His third publication Four Horse Parable is from Nun Prophet Press (2024).
summer evening
a silhouette at the shrine
bows deeply
– Keiko Izawa
the scent
of sunlit pine candles
cedar waxwings
– Brad Bennett
silent prayer …
a mouse sits under
the monk’s chair
– David He
running up and down
the spider’s thread
sunlight
– Erica Ison
autumn deepens —
sensei no longer offers
tea ceremonies
– Kanchan Chatterjee
wild side
cowboy roses
in a field of daisies
– Christine Wenk-Harrison
rocking in it
this summer dark
without a name
– Dan Schwerin
the circus
comes to town
cumulus clouds
– Jeff Hoagland
city crickets
the moon a crescent shy
of full
– Anne Elise Burgevin
chimney swift
more wind
than sky
– Mark Forrester
taking back the night …
three sisters buckle on
Orion’s belt
– Kristen Lindquist
now I have you penis fly trap
– susan burch
postpartum …
shrinking back
to obscurity
– Julie Schwerin
all my curves an apostrophe
– Rowan Beckett Minor
after 3 clicks
of my ruby slips
same old same old
– Roberta Beary
lotus pose
one
divided by nothing
– Scott Mason
famine —
a crisis
in definition
– Kathryn Liebowitz
with all your
deciduating
you bare yourself to me
– Jennifer Gurney
twilit murmuration
all the obscure things
you forget
– Ross Moore
our way
up the mountain
calligraphy
– Jeff Hoagland
an anthill
just missing
the Zen garden
– Dan Schwerin
singing bowl —
all the thoughts
i can not voice
– Mona Bedi
craft gin
an acquaintance pours
his heart out
– Polona Oblak
saké moon
falling for a man
I’ve never met
– Allyson Whipple
the fever pitch
of a bonfire
she didn’t say no either
– Ravi Kiran
leaving behind
my appeal to emotion
white snow
– Richa Sharma
Milky Way
reading the vastness
in your love letters
– Alfred Booth
corn maze …
still wondering
how we separated
– Barrie Levine
bletting medlars
the slow softening
of her fury
– John Hawkhead
pond walk …
our old argument
making new circles
– Ann Sullivan
air strike
reading love poems
in the shelter
– Mariangela Canzi
Oktoberfest
the setting sun streams
through Steinhenge
– Scott Mason
poetry meeting
sunlight streams onto
a bowl of mixed nuts
– Agnes Eva Savich
duck pond
leaves falling
through the quacks
– Jan Stretch
Bashō bash
we fail to come up
with a frog haiku
– Rupa Anand
Halloween party
his fangs
of candy corn
– Nancy Brady
evening breeze
a cherry blossom
in her craft cocktail
– Christine Wenk-Harrison
snow cone truck …
the taste of summer
colors our lips
– Stephenie Story
cirrus wisps
a spider repairs
rain tears
– Brad Bennett
the tinkling
of Angolan reed frogs
stars commingle
– Deborah Bowman
beach ready
baby turtles flip-flop
across the sand
– Patricia Hawkhead
dry martini
a tsunami
of endorphins
– Stephanie Newbern
whirling bats
the big dipper slowly
changing shape
– a p hywel
Islandic myths
between one geyser eruption
and the next
– Maya Daneva
swift clouds
side-by-side
my germinal stage
– Richa Sharma
shooting star
wishing i had no need
for wishes
– Kevin Valentine
planetarium dome
a hush before
the universe begins
– Barrie Levine
panting —
the pull
of a mountain peak
– Srini
graveside …
added to eternity
21 grams
– Roland Packer
sacred mountain
from the bus window …
pin drop silence
– Neena Singh
Milky Way
the breath journey
inside myself
– Carmela Marino
rain-soaked
the weight on
the paperboy’s back
– Nitu Yumnam
desert willow
thick perfume
of grandmothers
– Scott Wiggerman
silencing
the shade
summer heat
– Gary Hotham
monsoon clouds
the everyday grey
of war news
– Hla Yin Mon
without crows
the bare branch returns
weightless
– Glenn McPherson
a newborn lamb
takes its first steps …
quietly falling snow
– Sue Courtney
friends and family
a pan of brownies
too warm to slice
– Susan Yavaniski
the comfort
in the neighbor’s porch light
winter dusk
– Govind Joshi
christmas
our reflection
in the same red bauble
– Gareth Nurden
bedtime …
I read a nursery rhyme
to my mother
– Roland Packer
wedding band gold of lower purity
– Patricia Hawkhead
permanent scar
where he arrived
before he departed
– Ann Sullivan
purgatory my heart in the right place
– Cynthia Anderson
scraping
her skin raw
— lemon zest
– Nancy Brady
wedding anniversary —
the same Malbec
different thoughts
– Nalini Shetty
hobo jungle
some of the slumgullion
still moving
– Frank Higgins
cold moon
the last of the litter
never sees daylight
– Sharon Martina
purple crocus
in a dark patch
first winter alone
– C.X. Turner
the first blossom
to fall
a stillborn child
– Rick Jackofsky
wax-dipped petals
her wedding bouquet
in the thrift shop
– Kimberly Kuchar
broken statue the burden of history
– Pravat Kumar Padhy
empty snail shell
the refugee child’s greeting me
in four languages
– Alexander Groth
second plane
approaching the South Tower
— November election
– Ann Sullivan
new government —
swallows rebuilding
their nest
– Mariangela Canzi
Palestinian protest
The old schoolyard becomes
A battleground
– Sophia Conway
glass cabinet of books
in the homestead soddy
her first love
– Randy Brooks
untilled field
the camp kids attack
the rusted tractor
– Matt Beck
train station
the century-old platform
keeps stretching
– Srinivasa Rao Sambangi
Every cow in the herd
looks up as we pass —
plains boredom
– M. R. Pelletier
a bucket
in an empty well
dad’s wedding ring
– Robert Witmer
november storm
the drunk swaying
with the trees
– Mike Gallagher
a beach ball
in the ebb tide
summer’s end
– Shawn Blair
migrant soul
ashes scattered
here and there
– Rick Jackofsky
high noon …
my shadow
retracts
– Edward Kosiewicz
dock of the bay
at last the receding
people
– Richard L. Matta
a yellow patch
left by the toddler’s pool
summer’s end
– Meera Rehm
young again
my wife sings
to our grandson
– Robert Witmer
chalkfest
the sidewalk swimming
in sea life
– Helen Ogden
hot pavement
bare, little feet hopping
for ice cream
– C. Jean Downer
exiting the OR
the smell of
summer rain
– Mike Fainzilber
beach sand in a jar —
the layers
of a life
– Angela Terry
traveling ten thousand miles
to photograph
oneself
– Mike Fainzilber
hospice window
going somewhere
the tree and i
– Daya Bhat
a life full of next times end of summer
– Arvinder Kaur
muddy swimming hole
a cow pie plops
upstream
– Randy Brooks
between finger and thumb
a shell
the size of the sun
– Tony Williams
humanizing half an inchworm postpartum
– Rowan Beckett Minor
renaissance painting
mother and daughter
discuss perspective
– Tom Zille
masturbation you do you
– susan burch
the older me
a handful of gardenia
cuttings
– Jamie Wimberly
blackfly season …
shepherding so many little Buddhas
to the Pure Land
– Julie Schwerin
chopped onions
crusted onto a stock pot —
my bad habits
– Julie Bloss Kelsey
stropping the razor
my choices
under review
– Marilyn Humbert
eclipse viewing
the dandelions
we step on
– Archie G. Carlos
speech rehearsal
the blank stare
of my refrigerator
– Al Williams
floating motes
the worn spot on
the saint’s foot
– John Pappas
harvest moon
I lie among the leaves
harvesting stars
– Peggy Hale Bilbro
reaching
for the sky
star jasmine
– Leon Tefft
akizakura —
the spring lost
inside autumn
– Maria Tosti
bench plaque
he loved it here
this otherworldly view
– Joanna Ashwell
Victorian station
sudden latticed sunlight
brightens the platform
– Annie Bachini
mountaintop meal
our plates sprinkled
with summer stars
– Keiko Izawa
dappled light
with each breath
honeysuckle
– Audrey Quinn
stone skipping the water moon bouncing across the pond
– John Zheng
winter sun
flashes in and out
wet bike spokes
– Almila Dükel
tenth decade
not entering
any more contests
– Ruth Holzer
relief map
the peaks and valleys
of my face
– Cynthia Anderson
grandma’s car keys
in the fruit bowl
Best by Date expired
– Caroline Giles Banks
frankincense oil —
another gray hair
in my beard
– Joshua Gage
chalk beach
finding the prehistoric
in me
– Debbie Strange
tabla recital —
oh, the silence
between the beats
– Ram Chandran
Outside the Quaker Meeting House
the noises
people make
– Alexis Rotella
earth talk —
symposiums in
ac rooms
– Kalyanee Arandhara
teacher blues
the sunday night sounds
of 4th quarter football
– John Pappas
D-Day …
the stories my father would
not tell
– Valentina Ranaldi-Adams
finding a mole
on her inner thigh
moonlight
– Jamie Wimberly
winter chill
the dog ignores
my call for a walk
– Madhuri Pillai
kerfed oak
gray grief
returns
– Laurie Wilcox-Meyer
partial eclipse —
my father sees
a little less
– Mark Forrester
skate key
on a gray string
summer’s end
– Marilyn Ashbaugh
piano recital
listening with
god’s ears
– Pat Davis
seagulls plunge
and the tarpon swirl —
party boat
– Scott Mason
ghost bat
trying to stay off
my boss’s radar
– susan burch
witching hour
I find my mother-in-law
with a broom
– Vandana Parashar
blue movie
a damaging exposure
to ozone
– John Hawkhead
Father’s Day
the before and after photos
from pressure washing
– Evan Vandermeer
priest in the park
a dove eavesdrops
on the confession
– Mona Iordan
rain
on wattle blossom
the weight of memory
– Gavin Austin
peony pods
the young priest describes
self-mummification
– R. J. Swanson
Pacific wave after wave
what’s left
of my immigrant dream
– Chen-ou Liu
Time’s Square
the pick-pocket’s
silent hustle
– Bryan Rickert
unhomed
the first to pay
her respects
– Marilyn Ashbaugh
pick-up game
the bullied boy
done and dusted
– Roberta Beary
a leaf in the wind
does she know she’s trembling
the old neighbour
– Marie Derley
twilit pond —
too old to hear
the peeper’s song
– Terri L. French
gastric bypass
spinning his wedding ring
round and round
– David Green
another stir
of alphabet soup
poetry prompt
– Richard L. Matta
spice route
the migration story
of a cabbie
– Ravi Kiran
binge watch
the dog hungry for more
scratches at the door
– Steve Black
digestion
a hot wind stirs up
the cicadas
– Agnes Eva Savich
a full moon —
our neighbor’s sheep
become rowdy
– Goran Gatalica
forget-me-nots
daughter’s bruises
from a peace rally
– Archie G. Carlos
warning: turbulence
the teen next to me
plays air guitar
– Seth Friedman
ceasefire —
in the soldier’s house
Roman candles
– Suraj Nanu
graduation day
the dorm rooms breathe
a sigh of relief
– Nancy Orr
ginkgo walk —
the obscured sound
of a distant train
– Shiva Bhusal
pilgrim’s passage
at the river crossing
swollen dreams
– Bonnie J Scherer
mid-way through
the labyrinth …
slug trail
– Terri L. French
dropping blossoms
along the way
a migrant withers
– petro c. k.
morning mist
the path to nowhere
disappears
– Alvin B. Cruz
putting a shine
on my blues
bike for sale
– Deborah Bowman
recovered closeness …
I change
his biopsy dressing
– Jo McInerney
broken crayons —
my son still finds
the rainbow
– Nalini Shetty
time
to compromise
sunflowers at night
– Meera Rehm
philemaphobia
the day she shared
her chewed gum
– Dipankar Dasgupta
graphing
the quadratic formula
brown pelicans
– Joshua St. Claire
welcoming migrants
the birder
in me
– Pat Davis
morning tea
mist lingers
over the lake
– B. L. Bruce
sweltering heat
then the coolness
of the sax
– Bryan Rickert
wintering
in the garage
woven beach chairs
– Roberta Beach Jacobson
hospice ward —
she allows
a spider weaving the web
– Ram Chandran
sharpened #2
writing down
to my erasure
– Lorraine A Padden
a stool with one short leg
when did I grow old?
– Allison Douglas-Tourner
health checkup …
my body reduced to
numbers
– K. Ramesh
half-buried
in dead leaves
a plastic skeleton
– Ruth Holzer
Art by Steve Valentine, Haiku by Kevin Valentine
