Adele Evershed — Touchstone Award for Individual Poems — Winner 2025
Adele Evershed is the recipient of a Touchstone Award for Individual Poems for 2025, for the poem:
an old olive tree
listed
among the dead
— Adele Evershed, Frogpond, Volume 48:2, Spring/Summer 2025.
Commentary from the Panel:
In many parts of the world, farmers rely on olive trees as a source of income. To destroy a family’s trees is to send the family into poverty. In Gaza in particular, Palestinians are not only being killed with bombs and guns but also starved to death.
Olive trees also represent Palestinians’ rooted relationship to the land and are historical evidence of their existence in a place where they are rendered nameless. The word “old” supports this sense of rootedness and provides a lovely rhythm and assonance without drawing attention to itself.
In addition to evoking the political and economic devastation of destroying ancient olive groves in Palestine, the poem also honors trees as living beings whose deaths add to the already grievous hole in our collective psyche. The word “listed” is the power word in this poem. The TV station Al Jazeera shows a list of the dead each day as a way to counter the erasure of a culture. And while a tree may not make it to an official list of casualties, a family and community can still keenly feel its loss.
The position of the word “listed” in the middle of the poem serves to unbalance the reader and brings to mind the sense of its other meaning, “tilted to one side.” In this way, the poem departs from the conventional fragment-phrase structure, to powerful effect. In this interpretation, the scene becomes visual: the destroyed tree among the human bodies on the ground. The poem’s structure and the universal understanding of the olive branch as a symbol of peace combine to achieve the sense of disorientation and hope lost in a time of war.
The poet has, with great empathy, depicted a timely topic through clear, original imagery, precise word choice, and skillful use of structure.
Touchstone winners receive a crystal award to commemorate their selection. See the complete list of winners of both Individual Poem Awards and Distinguished Books Awards in the Touchstone Archives.
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Comments (15)
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Really appreciate the thoughtful and wide-reaching comments here, especially Keith’s and Alan’s. Thank you both!
Having been thinking about this for much of the day since commenting below in reply to Chad, I’d also add that there is a touch of irony in this verse, a quality to be valued in haikai. That the collateral damage of war should extend to the very symbol of peace and goodwill; that a harmless tree hundreds of years old should be wiped out accidentally in a single moment of savage hostility; that humankind in its aggression destroys even the fruit it cherishes.
In addition: thinking about the difference between “an” old olive tree and “the” old olive tree, the choice of “an” counts. It is as if this is just seen as a casual casualty. But we know by this word that it is just one of many.
This is a great haiku.
After all, hai can mean playful, and not just in a limited monochrome manner.
Also the haiku is fascinating as forests communicate by sound, and below a whole symbiotic civilisation hellbent on working together (using irony there).
In recent times fact is now, when allowed, much stranger than fiction.
Scientific American:
Do Trees Really Support Each Other through a Network of Fungi?
Trees communicate and cooperate through a fungal web, according to a widespread idea. But not everyone is convinced
BY STEPHANIE PAPPAS EDITED BY ANDREA THOMPSON
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/do-trees-support-each-other-through-a-network-of-fungi/
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/mar/20/hybrid-organ-trees-fungi-union-loblolly-pines-startup-forest-management
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cx284ljnv31o
https://treepeople.org/2023/04/14/fungi-and-trees-plants/
Any loss of life should be a big deal, whether to this actual yet mystical world of trees, or any human loss, or both. After all, each olive tree might have likely been tended by generations of humanity:
an old olive tree
listed
among the dead
— Adele Evershed, Frogpond, Volume 48:2, Spring/Summer 2025
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Many thanks,
Matthew
There is nothing haiku about these. It should be renamed Western micropoems. Without metre. East is east.
Perhaps The Wasteland is more appropriate to be a standard of these
This verse was my favourite of those listed, and also appears in the Red Moon Anthology. Plain and effective both immediately and upon contemplation.
Someone archly suggested that it might also be read as an elegy for nature-based haiku. Its award shows otherwise!
Excellent poem. Congratulations Adele👏 . The commentary is equally outstanding and which enhances the reading of the poem .
This commentary makes the incredible importance of Adele’s poem even more clear and exemplifies the way that haiku/senyru as a poetic form has the power to say so much with so few words. That creative spirit is the essence of all art, and I’m thrilled that Adele was honored for it.
Too overtly political, no kigo, wonky line structure, meant to appeal however subtly to the now-fashionable sympathy for one of the three Muslim countries that border Israel and have been bent on her destruction since her founding.
The olive is mentioned in the World Kigo database as a kigo for autumn, I think. You’ll find it in the online saijiki at https://kigosai.sub.jp/001/archives/11460. It is in any case an ubiquitous keyword, replete with associations, if you take a gendai view.
I think the old olive tree, a non-combatant, symbolic of peace, fruitful, is sufficiently detached from partisan political readings. Political extrapolations may exist in the mind of the reader, influenced by contemporary hostilities and their own politics. They evidently were weighed by the panel. But reflection on the indiscriminate destruction brought about by war is an enduring, non-partisan, theme. I can imagine Marcus Aurelius writing this in his diary. And, alas, others to come in wars that haven’t been started yet.
The enduring, rather than ephemeral, nature of this haiku is to be applauded. To me, it is a unifying and not a divisive verse.
As to lineation, the three line convention is an ELH artefact. With a customary long middle part, it’s a corollary of attempting to emulate 5-7-5 Japanese speech patterns in English. Here, we have in essence a one-line ichibutsujitate, expressed as a single sentence with the last word acting as a ‘cut’ (“dead” being pretty effective as a cut), completing the verse and inviting the reader to return and contemplate it. If seen as two parts, they are asymmetric in the traditions of the genre. In practice, the linebreaks introduce pauses and slow the reader, adding weight as we read.
Haiku grew into its own genre just before Japan entered World War Two. Some poets sidestepped the politically demanded pretty nature verses or the repugnant pro-war patriotism of sending generations to death by war:
Forgive, but Do Not Forget: Modern Haiku and Totalitarianism
Udo Wenzel interviews Itō Yūki
https://www.haiku-heute.de/archiv/iwenzel-ito-yuki-forgive-but-do-not-forget/
https://thehaikufoundation.org/juxta/juxta-1-1/forgive-but-do-not-forget-modern-haiku-and-totalitarianism/
The Kempeitai (憲兵隊, “Military Police Corps”) was the brutal secret police and military police force of the Imperial Japanese Army from 1881 to 1945. Often likened to Nazi Germany’s Gestapo or the Soviet NKVD, the Kempeitai operated as a pervasive, feared organization that maintained discipline within the armed forces while exercising strict surveillance and “thought control” over civilians in Japan and occupied territories.
Wikipedia
Not all details have been officially disclosed though it’s suggested they were far worse that even the Gestapo or the Soviet NKVD.
The G-force of Blue | Touching Base with Gendai haiku by Alan Summers
This article is also in memory of Shimada Seihô (1882-1944) who died from his torture treatment.
https://area17.blogspot.com/2013/07/the-g-force-of-blue-touching-base-with.html
The olive tree has been cultivated famously by Greek farmers as well, and is often thought of as a universal symbol of peace, as extending an olive branch.
______________________________
Olive Tree Season Breakdown
______________________________
Spring (March–May): Flowering occurs, attracting pollinators. Buds appear and new growth starts.
Summer (June–August):
Tiny olives emerge and grow, turning from green to shades of purple and black, with the trees thriving in hot weather.
Autumn/Winter (September–January):
Harvest time. Green olives are picked from late September, with black olives ready by mid-November through January.
Winter (Late Winter):
Tree enters dormancy after harvesting is completed.
SOURCE The Norfolk Olive Tree Company UK
Olive trees have been cultivated across Palestine for thousands of years. The olive harvest, known as “mawsim al-zaytoun”, begins in October, with preparations starting in September (Autumn/Fall).
The spirituality surrounding the olive tree in Palestine is profoundly powerful, deeply intertwining faith, land, and identity. For Palestinians, these ancient trees—some thousands of years old—are not just a source of livelihood, but sacred symbols of divine blessing, peaceful endurance, and deep-rooted ancestral connection to the earth. SOURCE: Embrace the Middle East
_________________________________
Sacred Significance across Faiths
_________________________________
The olive tree holds immense spiritual weight in the region’s major religions:
World Council of Churches:
In Islam:
The olive tree and its oil are praised in the Quran as a symbol of divine light and a blessed fruit. Islamic traditions (Hadith) also encourage planting and utilizing the olive, elevating it to a symbol of enduring faith and hope.
In Christianity:
The Mount of Olives in Jerusalem holds some of the most profound spiritual significance in Christian history, serving as a backdrop to the life, teachings, and prayers of Jesus.
A Universal Anchor:
Many ancient groves are treated as sacred sanctuaries. People of all faiths visit them to pray, seek blessings, and reflect on the divine, viewing the olive tree as a gift from God that stands strong against the trials of time.
SOURC: World Council of Churches
Olive trees can be so old they would have ‘witnessed’/’felt’/’heard’ many major conflicts, think Greece during WWII
an old olive tree
listed
among the dead
— Adele Evershed, Frogpond, Volume 48:2, Spring/Summer 2025.
Humans think small, mostly in four year groupings politically, a single or barely two generations unless family members have fought in wars, and olive groves have been around for most of the first ever major wars that humans invented and indulge.
_______________________________________
Historic Targets of Agricultural Warfare
_______________________________________
Ancient Greece: During the Peloponnesian War (431–404 BCE), Spartans cut down the olive trees around Athens to cripple the Athenian economy and force them out of their fortified walls.
The Levant: Centuries of conquests have seen olive groves targeted as a means of erasing cultural identity and severely punishing civilian populations by destroying their primary source of income.
SOURCE: MedForest
MedForest Modern Conflicts:
Palestine (West Bank and Gaza):
Olive groves are at the center of intense, ongoing localized conflict and territorial disputes. Since 1967, Israeli military operations, settlement expansion, and deliberate attacks by Israeli settlers have led to the destruction of well over one million Palestinian olive trees. During ongoing regional wars, these groves have frequently been blockaded, uprooted, or burned.
Syria:
During the Syrian civil war, thousands of ancient olive groves, particularly in the Afrin region, have been burned, uprooted, or logged for timber and illicit trade.
SOURCE: The Ecologist
an old olive tree
listed
among the dead
— Adele Evershed, Frogpond, Volume 48:2, Spring/Summer 2025.
Nature and bloodline, nature and bloodshed are never far away in the human era.
.
In traditional Japanese saijiki (seasonal almanacs), olive trees do not have a strict kigo (season word) due to their Mediterranean origins. However, to use olive trees in a haiku while following kigo traditions, you must link them to a specific season based on their natural lifecycle and the harvest. Wikipedia
Seasonal Associations
Autumn (Autumn / Shū): This is the traditional time for the olive harvest and olive picking. In modern and international haiku, “olive harvest,” “green olives,” or “dark ripe olives” serve as autumn kigo.
Winter (Winter / Fuyu): The harvesting of olives sometimes extends into winter. Additionally, the tree’s distinct silver-backed leaves shimmering in cool, crisp winter winds can create a strong winter atmosphere.
Summer (Summer / Natsu): Olives thrive in intense, baking heat. Describing olive groves under a blazing summer sun or during a prolonged drought can serve as a summer kigo.
Fay Aoyagi’s site is immensely useful for modern and contemporary Japanese-language haiku, given in romanised Japanese and English translations too.
The search engine only brought up one olive haiku, war, and battle, brought up many. Many battles and their sites are celebrated.
an old olive tree
listed
among the dead
— Adele Evershed, Frogpond, Volume 48:2, Spring/Summer 2025.
I don’t think we can easily really separate nature, death, politics, as all that is happening in abundance.
I mentioned Fay Aoyagi’s site though never gave the link, apologies:
https://fayaoyagi.wordpress.com
We tend to adhere more to non-Japanese rules, and approaches, than note how haiku, which originated in Japan, is actually written currently, even possibly historically:
https://fayaoyagi.wordpress.com/2026/04/22/todays-haiku-april-22-2026/
Fay Aoyagi biography:
https://haikupoetinterviews.wordpress.com/2024/03/01/fay-aoyagi-japanese-青柳飛/
This is a really memorable haiku that will endure. z congratulations Adele
Wonderful. This poem resonated with me the moment i read it. The commentary, given the current global situation, is an excellent one, opening the poem up further.
Congratulations to the poet. Well deserved.