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HAIKU DIALOGUE – Avian Adventures – Diversity (1)

Avian Adventures with Guest Editor Nancy Brady

Birds have been around since the days of the dinosaurs in the form of pteradons and archaeopteryx. Whenever I hear the distinctive squawk of a Great Blue heron, I imagine that pteradons sounded like them, filling the skies with their raucous calls. What these prehistoric birds really sounded like no one knows; however, I can state that birds have found places throughout the earth.

As a child, I was fascinated with birds, even trying to catch one by putting salt on its tail. Of course, I was unsuccessful. Along the way, I learned to identify the birds visiting our yard: cardinals, blue jays, robins, red-winged blackbirds, and even an occasional ruby-throated hummingbird.

Over the years, though, I have expanded my knowledge (and sightings) of various species of birds through travel, here in the US and abroad, and through moves – the latest to the coast of Lake Erie where birds live, gather, and migrate through the region. Having the opportunity to observe our avian friends has given me a greater appreciation of them.

In lieu of binoculars, my digital camera (DSLR) with a zoom lens has further allowed me to see individual feathers, tarsus (feet), or other parts of a bird’s external anatomy. I am not a classic birder per se, spending every free moment in pursuit of the “one that got away,” nor am I an expert (far from it), but I am an enthusiastic fan of our feathered friends, enjoying the discovery of something new. This opportunity to observe them up close and personal helps me write a fair number of haiku about birds. I hope you’ll join me in these avian adventures.

Below is Nancy’s selection of poems on the theme of diversity:

There were over 300 haiku submitted from poets in 30 different countries. Birds of all kinds were represented showing the diversity of the featured creatures. I found myself looking up birds, their songs, and other information pertaining to them, which were previously unfamiliar to me. I have learned so much, thanks to all of your haiku. There were also examples of diversity of the human kind in the mix.

Thank you to all who entrusted me with their haiku, and it wasn’t easy to narrow down my choices from many excellent haiku. If, however, I did not choose one of your haiku, that does not mean it shouldn’t be submitted to other journals. Many haiku I have written for Haiku Dialogue, but weren’t chosen at the time, have gone on to be published elsewhere. More than anything else, continue to write; the world needs your voice.

a plague of grackles
clacks from the shagbarks
they too sing of spring

Matt Robison
Kettering, Ohio

 

Birds in my garden –
so many songs
I no longer hear

Caroline Ridley-Duff
UK

 

Christmas eve
only the snow the same
on both sides of the street

Stephen A. Peters
Bellingham, WA

 

oriental kingfishers
the blackboard tree
wears a rainbow

Daya Bhat
India

 

Of a feather, one.
Beak, wing, and tail diverge,
lovely as the next.

Linda K. Gifford
Kansas City, MO

 

on the rooftop
all crows aligned
all but one

Sébastien Revon
Ireland

 

pair of egrets
only one goes beyond fear

Barbara Anna Gaiardoni
Verona, Italy

 

hiding in plain sight –
a rainbow
in the crow’s wing

Jonathan Aylett
Liverpool, UK

 

newborn’s hair
black and slick…
young raven

Ana Growl
Surrey, UK

 

for crows
It’s murder and
grackles a plague

Linda Ludwig
Inverness, Florida

 

between the mudbank
and the cordgrass
a rail’s orange bill

Bruce H. Feingold
Berkeley, CA, USA

 

sparrows
tiny beaks are
easy to feed

Jeff Leong
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

 

circling hawks-
alarm symphony
in action

Radhika De Silva
Colombo, Sri Lanka

 

birders mistake
an osprey for an eagle
ruffled feathers

Jenn Ryan-Jauregui
Tucson, Arizona, USA

 

a brown pigeon
in a flock of gray
how I fit in

Jackie Chou
United States

 

a new layer of snow –
in the tree a hooded crow
supports her point of view

Daniela Lăcrămioara Capotă
Romania

 

raven
in a snow storm
all the more visible

Jerome Berglund
Minneapolis, Minnesota

 

mother loves
every hatchling—
cuckoo too

Stephen J. DeGuire
Los Angeles, CA

 

in every
murmuration, several
still whispers

Curt Linderman
United States

 

dinosaur daughters-
so many ways
to be a bird

Ruth Happel
United States

 

piercing eyes
pointed beak — the butcherbird
knows his cuts of meat

Bonnie J Scherer
Alaska, USA

 

in each village
the bush warblers trill
in their own dialect

kris moon kondo
Kiyokawa, Kanagawa, Japan

 

mistle thrush
by the rustic trellis
a blackbird song

Mike Gallagher
Ireland

 

morning walk
a plover and a magpie
join me at the crossing

Margaret Mahony
Australia

 

etching a blue streak
across this stream
a kingfisher

Charles Harper
Yokohama

 

first stars
a peacock’s colors drip
into the night

Ravi Kiran
India

 

peacock eyes
shimmering iridescent blues
madhuvanti raga

Kavita Ratna
India

 

if only we were
birds
of a feather

Firdraus Perez
India

 

redwings and boat-tails. . .
a wave of shadows
through the marsh

marilyn ashbaugh
edwardsburg, michigan

 

photo session the foreign faces I’m wearing

Mirela Brailean
Romania

 

winter sparrow
wearing feathers of fluff
weightlessness

Teiichi Suzuki
Japan

 

that kid I share
my bread with
instant sibling

anak yang kuajak
berbagi roti
saudara dadakan

Christopher Calvin
Kota Mojokerto, Indonesia

 

twilight becoming the night heron

Bryan Rickert
Belleville, Illinois, USA

 

different wind –
the same blackbird is back
on the old pine

Maria Teresa Sisti
Italy

 

smorgasbord of sparrows
a sparrowhawk
breaks up the party

Tracy Davidson
Warwickshire, UK

 

darkened sky
on a sunshiny day
passenger pigeons

Chen Xiaoou
Kunming, China

 

strutting peacock
imagining a world
of just little brown jobbies

Ingrid Baluchi
North Macedonia

 

midtown park …
all differently colored
birds

Samo Kreutz
Ljubljana, Slovenia

 

cedar waxwings
migrating north
angry mockingbirds

Herbert Shippey
Tifton, Georgia

 

teenage twins
one reaching for the stars
the other gazing at the moon

Sam Morris
United Kingdom

 

potluck
learning the authentic names
of potatoes

Wai Mei Wong
Toronto, Canada

 

rainbow lorikeets
enjoy a drop of red
Corymbia ficifolia

Carol Reynolds
Australia

 

the last trump
up spring’s sleeve –
white swallow

Ivan Georgiev
Germany

 

Firetail Finch
dances out on a limb
empty handed

ron scully
Burien WA

 

party girls in pink
line dancing
…galahs

wanda amos
Old Bar, Australia

 

lookalikes …
that parrot’s eyes
in his mirror

Samo Kreutz
Ljubljana, Slovenia

 

a contest for love
beautiful feathers
of a male peacock

Ronjo Cayetano
Oriental Mindoro, Philippines

 

dawn chorus
what a maestro
their conductor is

Vandana Parashar
India

 

mating season
a starling mimics
my song

mona bedi
India

 

down the river
a flock of flamingos fishing
without worms

Aine Losauro
City of Passi, Philippines

 

talking about diversity…
my left brain
vs right brain

Ram Chandran
India

 

mottled skin
the blackbird
with white patches

Ann Rawson
UK

 

under the sunlight
siblings playing together
different peacocks

Lexie Gem Zaragoza
Philippines

 

different colors
flying as one
a scarlet macaw

Ruth H. Hermosa
Gloria, Oriental Mindoro, Philippines

 

cleanliness of the street
the leaves each morning
more colourful

Dejan Ivanovic
Lazarevac, Serbia

 

far away from home …
a quaint black crow watching me,
both curious

(NB: Crows in my part of the country are grey crows)

Natalia Kuznetsova
Russia

 

sunny morning
the nightingale’s song is interrupted
by the crow’s cry

Slobodan Pupovac
Zagreb, Croatia

 

human organism –
so many diseases
and one target

Aljoša Vuković
Croatia, Šibenik

 

songs of birds
I know who wakes me up
by the voices

Stoianka Boianova
Bulgaria

 

swift flight correction swallow

Herb Tate
UK

 

mockingbird…
his song
of songs

Laurie Greer
Washington, DC

 

some rosier than the rest house finches

Cynthia Anderson
Yucca Valley, California

 

collared redstarts
and chickadees shack up together
in a tree hole

Guido De Pelsmaeker
België (Holsbeek)

 

sparrow nest
one of these eggs
is not like the others

(One explanation could be that a cowbird has laid eggs in the sparrow’s nest)

Susan Burch
Hagerstown, MD

 

morning caw
I wonder if it is
a crow or a raven or …

Meera Rehm
UK

 

beside
the jackfruit
beehive

Jagajit Salam
Imphal, India

 

depression deepens
I learn the different names
of crows

Adele Evershed
Wilton, Connecticut

 

autumn evening
kingfisher meets cuckoos
in new neighborhood

Govind Joshi
Dehradun, India

 

mixer
wooed by the intricacy
of his song

Caroline Giles Banks
Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA

 

rain-dark afternoon
ravens with plenty more
to say…

Tony Williams
Scotland, UK

 

bird watchers —
Nightingale and Chick
warn of Barred Owl attacks!

Allison Douglas-Tourner
Victoria, BC Canada

 

same colour
diversity in song
two black birds

Chittaluri Satyanarayana
Hyderabad, India

 

visitor
a chiffchaff
our nose up

Luciana Moretto
Treviso, Italy

 

winter bird count
passenger pigeons
without a number

Richard Straw
Cary, North Carolina

 

pigeons orbit
safe from
red-tailed hawk

April Woody
Virginia

 

bird songs
must I find
a favorite

Roberta Beach Jacobson
Indianola, Iowa, USA

 

outdoor spring concert
the many voices
of birds

Marianne Sahlin
Sweden

 

worm pink . . . my backyard robin unearths a kigo

Barrie Levine
Massachusetts, USA

 

pigeons on the wire
all different
but the same

Kerry J Heckman
Seattle, WA

 

preschool –
coloring a blue jay
with the green crayon

Valentina Ranaldi-Adams
Fairlawn, Ohio USA

 

a cardinal rules
the feeder
juncos peck the snow

Susan Farner
United States

 

station waiting room
one−legged pigeon
pecking a nut alone

Keiko Izawa
Japan

 

white raven a percentage of dreams

Adrian Bouter
The Netherlands

 

afternoon stroll –
mergansers and mallards
sharing the small pond

Ann Sullivan
Massachusetts USA

 

the same flavor
in different colors
yet we choose

Holly Brennan
Massachusetts, USA

 

dew …
a different sun
in every drop

Maria Teresa Piras
Serrenti – Italy

 

a kookaburra’s laugh
morphs into magpie song
lyrebird

Louise Hopewell
Australia

 

Sky or sea
Color of their eyes
undecided

Lanka Siriwardana
Sri Lanka

 

ruffling through
the sparrow pages
Dunnock song

Robert Kingston
Chelmsford, United Kingdom

 

never too small
to make a difference
winter wren

Lori Kiefer
London UK

 

passero solitario…
stormo di rondini
pellegrine

lonely sparrow…
flock of pilgrim
swallows

Giuliana Ravaglia
Bologna (Italy)

 

the hawk’s scream
in the rosehip bush
a wounded finch

Mircea Moldovan
România

 

nightingale song
sleepless
as if love never ends

Jonathan English
Washington, DC

 

battlefront –
just the murmuration
of a starling volley

Dan C. Iulian
România

 

sparrow on a wire
pretending to sing . . .
the blackbird’s song

Tomislav Maretić
Zagreb, Croatia

 

drinking elixir of life
around turtle tears
butterflies

Nitu Yumnam
India

 

sunflower seeds
my windowsill swarming
with cone-shaped beaks

Tomislav Sjekloća
Cetinje, Montenegro

 

harvest day . . .
a cacophony of crows
circle the field

Kathleen Trocmet
Texas, USA

 

a cloud of starlings
swirls in the twilight …
each has its own song

Annie Wilson
Shropshire, UK

 

cypress buds…
multilingual chatter
of nesting birds

Al Gallia
Louisiana, USA

 

backyard birding . . .
all the colors perched
on one family tree

C.F. Tash
Washington, DC USA

 

awakening…
the same but different
robin song

C.X.Turner
United Kingdom

 

the sparrow
talks with the chickadee
…fence mending

Alan Harvey
Tacoma, WA

 

from the lonely branch
more distinguishable
the singing

dal ramo solitario
più distinguibile
il canto

Maria Cezza
Italy

 

fondant for a gull
a swan
always meringue

Helene Guojah
UK

 

our marriage –
unmatched socks
becoming a pair

Cristina Povero
Italy

 

different
from the others –
buffleheads

Colette Kern
Southold, NY US

 

baby herons molting into the blue

Lorraine A. Padden
San Diego, California USA

 

nature walk
the song sparrow
ids as a red-tailed hawk

John S Green
Bellingham, Washington

 

without prejudice
their disparate voices merge
a blend of birdsong

Marcia Burton
Salt Spring Island, Canada

 

mocking bird crow a woodpecker answers

Kath Abela Wilson
Pasadena, California

 

line at feeder
ravens and crows
pecking order

Sigrid Saradunn
Bar Harbor, Maine

 

Join us next week for Nancy’s commentary on additional poems, & our next prompt…

 

Guest Editor Nancy Brady is a pharmacist by profession, a haiku and senryu poet by nature. She often found inspiration on her treks back and forth to work as a pharmacist; her first book of haiku, Ohayo Haiku, was a foray into publishing haiku. Three Breaths, her second book, is a mix of haiku, senryu, alternative forms, and other poems. Her work has appeared in journals all over the globe (both print and electronic) and rejected by many more. Nancy also writes other genres including a blog, and plans to publish a children’s book in 2023. She also reads lots of novels. Her favorite is, and remains, Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged, but she is also a big Harry Potter fan. Now retired, she, her husband Rob, and their cat, Regular Arcturus Black, live in Huron, Ohio, a block from Lake Erie, where the bird population is constantly changing.

Lori Zajkowski is the Post Manager for Haiku Dialogue. A novice haiku poet, she lives in New York City.

Managing Editor Katherine Munro lives in Whitehorse, Yukon Territory, and publishes under the name kjmunro. She is Membership Secretary for Haiku Canada, and her debut poetry collection is contractions (Red Moon Press, 2019). Find her at: kjmunro1560.wordpress.com.

The Haiku Foundation reminds you that participation in our offerings assumes respectful and appropriate behavior from all parties. Please see our Code of Conduct policy.

Please note that all poems & images appearing in Haiku Dialogue may not be used elsewhere without express permission – copyright is retained by the creators. Please see our Copyright Policies.

This Post Has 39 Comments

  1. Thank you Nancy ..Enjoyed the nice collection .
    Sri Lankan haiku is new to the world as we have recently started participating globally. Thank you so much for selecting 2 poems from Sri Lanka .
    These are the nice ones that took my heart.

    awakening…
    the same but different
    robin song

    C.X.Turner
    United Kingdom
    circling hawks-
    alarm symphony
    in action

    Radhika De Silva
    Colombo, Sri Lanka

    never too small
    to make a difference
    winter wren

    Lori Kiefer
    London UK

    Wish you success!
    Lanka Siriwardana

    1. Hi Lanka,

      I wasn’t aware that Sri Lankan haiku is new. I have noticed more poets from Sri Lanka recently; now I know why. I am seeing more haiku from there. The fact that the global community of poets is growing is diversity in and of itself.

      You’ve chosen some wonderful haiku to highlight. Thank you. I am sure the poets are pleased as well.

      Continued success is your poetic journey, Lanka.
      ~nan

  2. Hi Nancy,

    Many thanks for your review of so many haiku! I love the selection you printed and I feel humbled that you chose mine when you had so many wonderful haiku before you.

    This one made me smile.

    never too small
    to make a difference
    winter wren

    Lori Kiefer
    London UK

    I interpreted this to mean: Despite all our differences in size, color, religion, beliefs… that even the smallest and most unassuming among us has a voice worth raising and worth being listened to. What a wonderful song sung to us by this winter wren.

    1. Hi Holly,
      You are welcome; I’m glad you are pleased.

      Yes, I, too, liked Lori’s haiku; I like your interpretation of it, too. Whether Lori meant it that way or not, this interpretation is profound. Thanks for expressing this. ~nan

    1. Al,
      You are welcome. All the birds of different species together chattering, getting along, in one tree…if only humans would.

  3. Thank you so much Nancy for selecting my debut haiku to Haiku Dialogue. I really enjoyed myself reading your selection of amazing haiku on our feathered friends. Yes, I learnt a lot from our fellow haiku friends from around the world. I wish you all the best in your haiku journey. I would also like to express my sincere gratitude to Katherine and Lora for their hard work.

    1. Thanks, Radhika, I’m glad you submitted and that I got the honor of selecting your debut haiku. It feels amazing to see your name in print (or least it did for me). Keep reading and keep writing, and I hope you enjoy reading next week’s commentary on some of the haiku I selected for the short list. Yes, Kathy and Lori do a fantastic job. I am so thankful for their help through this month. Now, to finish that up. All my best.

  4. What an interesting way to bring us all together! Thank you for including my poem in your long list. There are so many that stand out to me. Here are three of them.

    mistle thrush
    by the rustic trellis
    a blackbird song

    Mike Gallagher
    Ireland

    ~ These words are lovely to read, both silently and aloud. I looked up the mistle thrush and read that a female blackbird is similar in appearance.

    newborn’s hair
    black and slick…
    young raven

    Ana Growl
    Surrey, UK

    ~ the foreboding appearance of an adult raven and the symbolism that is often attached – here we are reminded that they, too, were once babies.

    preschool –
    coloring a blue jay
    with the green crayon

    Valentina Ranaldi-Adams
    Fairlawn, Ohio USA

    ~ I recently colored a parrot in a grownup coloring book and looked up pictures to get it ‘right’. This poem reminded me of the bold creativity and impulsiveness we tend to lose along the way. I also imagine the preschooler not staying ‘in the lines.’

    1. April,
      You’re welcome.
      As for the three you mentioned, I agree with you. As for Gallagher’s mistle thrush (and I had to look that bird up) haiku, the wording of the haiku is both alliterative and musical. All those t sounds and s sounds.

      I really like the comparison of newborns with their slick hair to the young raven’s slick feathers, too. I think it is easy to forget (not see) the youngster in an adult whether a child or a bird, but we all went through that once ourselves. Well except for Athena who sprang out of Zeus’s head fully grown, but I digress.

      I think as adults we tend to do exactly what you did…tried to get the parrot ‘right’ but Valentina’s haiku reminds us of a time when we were freer-thinkers. There’s a Harry Chapin song, “Flowers are Red,” about a young boy who likes to draw flowers in varying colors and gets in trouble for it, finally indoctrinating him so much he can’t do anything but follow the rules. Every time I hear it, it saddens me. As a writer-friend of mine says in his book of off-the-wall suggestions, Use All the Colors, use all the colors life presents.

      Thanks for commenting on some of the haiku I really liked.

  5. Thanks much, Nancy for including my haiku in this Avian Diversity selection.
    A fabulous read.
    I particularly liked

    photo session the foreign faces I’m wearing

    Mirela Brailean
    Romania

    A powerful poem.

    And

    beside
    the jackfruit
    beehive

    Jagajit Salam
    Imphal, India

    A similarity I had never thought about.

    1. Govind,
      You’re welcome; it was my pleasure include your haiku.

      I agree with your assessment about Mirela’s haiku. It is powerful and can be looked at more than one way.

      Yes, Jagajit’s jackfruit/ beehive side by side comparison was quite interesting. Jackfruit was one of those words I had to look up because I was unfamiliar with it (to be honest, I had never heard of it before), but once I saw some photos of it, I understood better the haiku and just felt it needed to be read by others. Isn’t it wonderful to learn new things? (Ancora imparo–I am still learning!)

    2. Dear haiku friend, I am glad you appreciate my haiku! You find a real treasure here, right? so many great haiku!

      1. Hi Mirela,
        Yes, several people have mentioned liking your haiku, and there are many great haiku in the mix. Our global community of haiku poets is certainly represented here this week as well as all the others. If only the rest of the world could be as peaceful as haiku poets…

  6. The world would be very dull without our avian friends. It’s lovely to give them space here on Haiku Dialogue, thank you, Nancy, and for including one of mine.

    A rather sad one from Caroline, which could be taken in two ways:

    Birds in my garden –
    so many songs
    I no longer hear

    Caroline Ridley-Duff
    UK

    Impaired hearing especially as one ages is no joy; and residing, as I do, in a town with too many stray cats. The only safe birds here are swallows and swifts.

    And a happy one:

    party girls in pink
    line dancing
    …galahs

    wanda amos
    Old Bar, Australia

    What fun! I can just see this, can’t you?

    1. Ingrid,
      First, you had me checking out jobbies, and I loved your comparison between the colorful peacock and the plain birds. We definitely need color in our world, but we need the jobbies, too.

      I felt the sadness of Caroline ‘s haiku, too. Missing bird songs for whatever reason, and it would be devastating to me since I try to wake early enough (early summer only as I am more of a night owl than an early morning person) to listen to the tuning up of one, then two, then more birds as the night turns to sunrise. I can’t imagine losing that joy.

      As for Wanda’s haiku, yes, you are absolutely right. It’s happy and I, too, could see this. Just makes me smile, and I bet it did for you as well. I did have to look up galah though.

      Thanks for commenting on these two as they were two that hit me from my first reading of them.

  7. Always a pleasure to read the Dialogue. Notable for me were:

    a) for its ingenuity and transitions in just four words:

    swift flight correction swallow
    — Herb Tate
    UK

    and b) for its sweet simplicity, and how it can be generalised to many other activities:

    mockingbird…
    his song
    of songs

    — Laurie Greer
    Washington, DC

    Love ’em.

    1. Keith, I agree with you on both haiku as well as always enjoying the column each week. Watching swifts make course corrections is awesome. One night a couple summers ago, when the muffleheads (midges) were forming their mating “cloud,” the swifts were zipping here and there, eating well. ~Nan

      1. Keith,
        Agreed! I don’t think my eyes could easily distinguish them in flight, they move so fast. I think that’s why the haiku works so well, I also think those were swallows grabbing their dinner on the fly. Here, we have several types of swallows and from photos, they were probably barn swallows. Regardless, that night of their feast, I was so fascinated watching them that I thought a few of them might hit me before veering swiftly away.

  8. baby herons molting into the blue
    /
    Lorraine A. Padden
    San Diego, California USA
    /
    This haiku has a nice flow to it.

    1. Valentina, I agree with you; it flows. Herons are such graceful birds, and I could just see it.
      ~Nan

  9. Congratulations on your first time guest editing, Nan! What a wonderful job you’ve done. I was particularly delighted to find 3 of my favorite poets (and people) all in a row.

    raven
    in a snow storm
    all the more visible

    Jerome Berglund
    Minneapolis, Minnesota

    mother loves
    every hatchling—
    cuckoo too

    Stephen J. DeGuire
    Los Angeles, CA

    in every
    murmuration, several
    still whispers

    Curt Linderman
    United States

    1. Eavonka,
      It was just a coincidence that your friends are paired together, but I am glad you appreciate their haiku. I obviously liked their haiku, too. Watching starlings’ murmurations fascinate me; it’s a wonder I didn’t have an accident the first time I saw the birds flying in unison. ~Nan

  10. Thank you for including me! I’ve been writing Haiku as a centering meditation and means to share thoughts with other writers for the last couple of years, but this is my first entry into anything! I’ve found countless hours of serenity in the woods, befriending my bird and squirrel neighbors. To this day, I know my many yard critters by individual name; ie: “Red and Cardi”, our Cardinal couple, and “STOPIT!”, the woodpecker who loves our siding, lol!

    1. Linda,
      Glad you joined the dialogue. Your approach to haiku sounds wonderful, and getting out into nature can’t be beat. I can’t claim to have named our birds, but we do call the squirrels around our neighborhood, Ralph, after the one who was so friendly. Of course, it might be because of my throwing of peanuts for the jays.
      ~Nan

  11. Congratulations Nancy on publishing your first column. Thank-you for choosing my
    haiku. Thank-you also to Kathy, Lori, and the Haiku Foundation.

    1. Thanks, Valentina, and you’re welcome. My favorite bird is the blue jay so your haiku really resonated with me. By the way, when I was looking up some other bird, I discovered that there are green jays. Did you know that? I certainly learned a thing or two about birds this past week.

      I owe a great big thanks to Kathy, Lori, and the Haiku Foundation, too. They are awesome .

  12. Thank you Nancy for taking us in a journey into the avian world. My knowledge is limited to common local and garden birds, hence it has been a blast, travelling the globe.

    1. Robert,
      I hope you (and everyone else) enjoy the journey. I spent a great deal of time looking at the various birds mentioned in everyone’s haiku including your Dunnock song. My bird knowledge has increased, if not exponentially, at least, greatly. I am more of a backyard birder although my husband and I did get to see some beautiful birds when we in Kenya like the Egyptian goose on the title page.
      ~Nan

    1. Barbara,
      After viewing the video, I can certainly believe that it is a great place to watch birds. We have egrets and herons in the summer although lately some of them have been wintering here. Egrets and herons, especially the Great Blue, are so majestic looking.
      ~Nan

    1. Margaret,
      Thanks for your vote of confidence on the theme, and it was a joy to read them all. Any favorites among them?

      ~Nan

  13. Mirela,
    Your monoku certainly addressed diversity in a unique way. As someone who takes digital photographs, I am often amazed later by what I captured on “film” when I go through the photos I took. Living in Europe as you do I imagine you do get many foreign faces even if inadvertently, yet those faces can be captivating. Well done to you even if I read something into your minimum you didn’t mean.

    Thanks for commenting and thanks for submitting your monoku, too.

    1. I hate auto-correct. How could it manage to change HAIKU into MINIMUM? Although…haiku is a minimalist poetry form. FWIW

        1. Mirela,
          I think it was supposed to be monoku that auto-correct made into minimum. I am glad you found humor in it. I often write haiku about crocuses, and I don’t know how many times auto-correct changed it to circuses. Obviously Bill Gates and other computer geeks don’t know about the flower.

          As I am about to hit the Post Comment button, I wonder if it will auto-correct me again.

  14. Thank you, Nancy, for including me on this list of successful haiku about failures! I have to ponder every poem…there were quite a few that stood out to me. I love poems that make me stop and think which is exactly what happened here. Best regards to all the contributors.

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