HAIKU DIALOGUE – Going for a Walk – on top of the world (mountains)

Going for a Walk with Guest Editor Deborah Karl-Brandt

The late Buddhist monk and peace activist Thich Nhat Hanh could see water in all its transformations. Water in the form of a cloud would soon become rain, a river, the sea, and it would help grow plants and trees. The trees would flourish and become paper on which the haijin would write their poetry, so that the cloud (water) would eventually be contained within the poetry itself. Nothing can exist by itself. Let’s take a walk together to follow the different paths of water and see where they will lead us.

prompt: on top of the world (mountains)

Mountains are beautiful. Shaped by the powerful forces of water and erosion, they are the link between heaven and earth.

In ancient China, there was the belief that gods and saints sought refuge on sacred mountains. Spirits also lived in the mountains. The dead were sometimes buried halfway up the mountain to help them on their journey to paradise.

It is not easy to climb a mountain. There can be many battles before you reach the top. And when you look down, you see the path you took and what you left behind. Sometimes problems that seem too big to overcome are suddenly like mosquitoes.

Write about your mountain hikes. About your struggles, about the beauty you saw along the way, about the people you met. Write about everything that happened to you while you were on a mountain trail. Maybe you were transformed out there yourself.

The deadline is midnight Eastern Daylight Time, Saturday August 03, 2024.

Please use the Haiku Dialogue submission form below to enter one or two original unpublished haiku inspired by the week’s theme, and then press Submit to send your entry. (The Submit button will not be available until the Name, Email, and Place of Residence fields are filled in.) With your poem, please include any special formatting requirements & your name & residence as you would like it to appear in the column. Please note that by submitting, you agree that your work may appear in the column – neither acknowledgment nor acceptance emails will be sent. All communication about the poems that are posted in the column will be added as blog comments.

Join us next week for Deborah’s selection of poems on the topic of on top of the world (mountains)…

Guest Editor Deborah Karl-Brandt lives in Bonn, Germany, with her husband, two rabbits and numerous books. After her PhD studies in Scandinavian languages and literatures, she now works as a freelance author and poet. One of her poems won 2nd place in the 2021 Pula Film Festival Haiku Contest. Her poems have most recently appeared in Prune Juice, Kingfisher, First Frost, Frogpond, Failed Haiku and Tsuridoro. If she is not outside for a long stroll or to do some birdwatching, she is an avid reader who is currently exploring Chinese Xianxia Webnovels.

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.

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Photo Credits:

Banner photo credit: Andreas Brandt

Haiku Dialogue offers a triweekly prompt for practicing your haiku. Posts appear each Wednesday with a prompt or a selection of poems from a previous week.