Book of the Week: the road behind
Mike Dillon has been plying his way with haiku for three decades. This is his only full-length book from all that time, from Red Moon Press in 2003.
You can read the entire book in the THF Digital Library.
All haiku in the Book of the Week Archive are selected by Tom Clausen, and are used with permission.
childhood home: the smoothness of the half-buried rock we used for home plateold cemetery: who'd leave daisies for a boy gone ninety years?a warm breeze passes through the wheat: Saturday lonelinessspring afternoon: the barber spins me around toward the mirrornew calf apart from the herd: evening starwild roses: the slow green river flows to the seawhite-caps comb the dark: the hands of the ferryman count my coinsI walk alone: the constant lights of a distant freighterearly sunset lights up the long road behindthe first rain drops pock the river's mouth: salmon splashinstead I came here: wind in the reedstrillium: water shines from deer tracksshortest day: snow beneath the cedar where our bulbs arefoghorn night: my coins make a small pile on the mantleFebruary dusk: I step over the light lingering in the puddlethe last kid picked running his fastest to right field
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” early sunset lights up” is a fine haiku, and ” spring afternoon” & ” foghorn night” ring vividly true.
This is my first reading of a lot of these haiku and they resonate with me on many levels. A very fine collection indeed and thanks for selecting it Tom, and to THF for bringing it to us.
I love this book – one of my absolute favourite collections. I’m planning to re-assess it in a future edition of A Hundred Gourds. What’s so wonderful about Mike’s haiku (and other poems) is the crystal-clear precision of his language. He’s a real artist with words.