*a short prose piece incorporating a haiku poem
One by me:
Lately I seem to be acutely aware in my dealings with people with what seems to be lacking rather than what I see or hear: a call that doesn’t come, an explanation cut short, a hand that doesn’t wave or eyes that don’t meet, and it strikes deep. How do you respond to what remains in the dark? I am reminded of a time I was camping in the forest, looking at the night sky:
“captivated by
what isn’t there-
quarter moon”
and this one by the master poet Basho always reminds me to be grateful and less self-centered:
(two notes :
1) the cry of a monkey was noted in Chinese and Japanese poetry for its plaintive nature, and poets would seek it out just as they would an autumn day when the maples were turning or a full moon evening. These outings were a common practice among the privileged classes
2) child abandonment was common among the impoverished.)
“I was walking along the Fuji River when I saw an abandoned child, barely two, weeping pitifully. Had his parents been unable to endure this floating world which is as wave-tossed as these rapids, and so left him here to wait out a life as brief as dew? He seemed like bush clover in autumn’s wind that might scatter in the evening or wither in the morning. I tossed him some food from my sleeve and said in passing,
‘those who listen for the monkeys:
what of this child
in the autumn wind?’”
translation by David Landis Barnhill
