HAIKU DIALOGUE – ink

This Post Has 80 Comments

1. Dear Kathy,

   Thank you for including my haiku in this wonderful collection written for your Ink prompt.

   I so enjoy participating and reading the fine haiku written by all.

   Eyes glued,

   Claire

2. Thank you Kathy for including my haiku in this week’s selection of ekphrastic writing. It’s amazing to see so many beautiful and thought-provoking haiku stemming from one source.

3. Kathy –
   Thank you for the intriguing photo prompts! I look forward each week to the responses – and a new prompt to capture my imagination.

4. the leaves and I reach
   for the lake
   to cool down

   1. Hello Laura. If this was intended for next week’s photo prompt, you just need to click on the red “contact form” in the above second paragraph before midnight today and it will go to Kathy for consideration.

      1. Thanks and apologies, being new to the blog, I mucked up and used the wrong contact box.

         1. thanks for catching this Debbie! & no worries, Laura – there is always next week! Please do submit again – a new prompt will be posted on Wednesday each week… kj

5. Thank you so much Kathy for including mine among these fine haiku inkterpretations. And thank you Alan for commentary! I too very much look forward each week to trying my hand at haiku and reading everyone’s.

   1. A black light torch might be a great Christmas gift for your daughter! 🙂
      Fascinating haiku and I wonder how far can a person go, in order to make a room meld to black?

6. Dear Kathy,

   My thanks for choosing my haiku once again. I am really in great company. Congrats to everyone.
   I especially enjoyed these three

   dark matter my mother says not to worry

   Adrian Bouter

   ink spots…
   the undefined contours
   of my fears
   .
   macchie d’inchiostro … i contorni indefiniti / delle mie paure
   .
   Lucia Cardillo

   the color of memories indelible ink
   .
   Rich Schilling
   Webster Groves, MO

7. Dear, Dear, Marietta McGregor…
   .
   Within the wallow of all the dark, of all the prose, a haiku of merit!
   .
   You nailed it with unexpected whimsy, and with a perfect foil; the Rothko reference.
   .
   You are a prize, and a gift to the haiku community!
   .
   .
   in front of Rothko
   a toddler standing
   on her head

   Marietta McGregor
   .
   Jan in Texas

8. Dear Kathy,

   Thank you for including mine in your artfully selected fine haiku this week. Working with a prompt is very helpful to our craft but we cannot do it alone.

   Thanks again,

   Margie Gustafson

   1. Dear Margie,
      .
      .
      Kathy runs a great feature, where people can discuss and comment on haiku and it’s really helpful isn’t it? 🙂
      .
      .
      Most weeks I try to post a themed commentary, and this week it’s The Five Quarters of Haiku:
      https://www.thehaikufoundation.org/2019/07/24/haiku-dialogue-ink/#comment-105051
      .
      .
      .
      After musical
      The theatre once more has
      To return to black
      .
      Margie Gustafson
      Lombard, IL USA
      .
      .
      I love this phrase!!!
      .
      “The theatre once more has to return to black”
      .
      aka
      .
      The theatre once more has
      To return to black
      .
      .
      It takes me back to childhood and big thick black closing curtains where actors might come out for another run of applause, and then simply ‘vanish’. 🙂
      .
      It’s been a long time since I’ve attended a musical. The last one was Terje Isungset’s version of The Emperor’s New Clothes, with the Emperor as a kind of British Prime Minister closely similar to Tony Blair. I remember we bumped into the actor and praised his work. It was an incredible production!

      1. Thank you so much, Alan!

         1. No worries, keep enjoying, it will feel new and fresh every day too!
            .
            Alan

      2. thanks for this, Alan, as always!

9. painting mindscape
   with
   your colours

   Anjali Warhadpande

   Maybe you paint an aura.
   I hope it’s not in black and white 🙂

   ——————-

   blue afternoon –
   the Rolling Stones sing
   paint it black

   I like this haiku.

   ————————

   teaching cursive…
   the writing is no longer
   on the wall

   Valentina Ranaldi-Adams

   …except on the walls of streets 🙂

   —————————————-

   daughter’s first painting
   in place of signature
   her fingerprints

   Tomislav Sjekloća

   what a charming haiku

   1. Thank you, Tsanka!

   2. Thank you Tomislav for liking my haiku!

      Anna Maria

   3. Thank-you for commenting on mine – good observation.

10. Another great week, and I learned several new words, not being an artist.
    .
    highlights and shadows
    the chiaroscuro life
    of my mother
    .
    Mark Meyer
    .
    The story and feeling here intrigued me.
    .
    the color of memories indelible ink
    .
    Rich Schilling
    .
    A lot packed into one short line!
    .
    new wife
    the traditionally white room
    becomes pink
    .
    Slobodan Pupovac
    Zagreb, Croatia
    .
    I enjoy hearing cultural traditions that are new to me. Is there some rebellion against the norm here?
    .
    blue afternoon-
    the Rolling Stones sing
    paint it black
    .
    anna maria domburg-sancristoforo
    .
    This lyrical haiku lifted the blues.
    .
    “…octopus draws with ink…” by Ljiljana
    Dobra was a clever use of the prompt.
    .
    And Alan Summers’ “…locker key glistens…” immediately reminded me of reading Nancy Drew mysteries when young.

    1. Thanks! 🙂
       .
       .
       deleted in draft
       all those words
       we won’t regret
       .
       Debbie Scheving
       Bremerton WA
       .
       .
       This reminds me of the old haiku email forums, where I tried to suggest that strong feelings be best put into draft and not sent a second later with regret. 🙂
       .
       If something or someone deeply upsets me I certainly consider a draft email with no email address inserted, and delete it a few moments later, having got whatever it was out of my system.
       .
       Sometimes to have no regrets, because we didn’t rush our words, is something to envy very much. Thanks for such a strong verse.

       1. Thank you Alan. My first attempts were about writing crossed out in ink, I go through a lot of pens myself, then it went in a different direction.

    2. Thanks for your comment on my haiku!

11. Dear Kathy
    thank you for including my works

    This one is stunning:

    dark matter my mother says not to worry

    Adrian Bouter

    Love it

12. Dear Kathy,
    thanks for including mine. this weekly challenge is a treasure trove for me.
    Nancy

13. fresh coat of paint
    on memories –
    from long time ago
    .
    SD Desai
    .
    Time has a way of changing memories.

14. Christmas eve
    hobo paints a pretty
    fireplace
    .
    Tsanka Shishkova
    .
    Nicely written haiku about the fact that not everyone is able to enjoy
    an abundance at Christmas.

15. Thanks Khaty for publishing my haiku, as usual I read some very interesting things, trying to learn to do better and better

16. Dear Kathy
    Thank you so much for including mine.
    I have so enjoyed responding to the images put up.

17. dark matter my mother says not to worry
    .
    Adrian Bouter
    .
    The intangible and uncontrollable at both ends, connected by a real and sage presence.

18. Amid all the darkness I appreciated these two humourous senryu (?) – Aljoša Vuković‘s ‘drunk painter – / one more work / of contemporary art’ and Barbara Tate‘s ‘abstract / off to lunch for a / brighter perspective’. Thanks KJ.

    1. Thank you Mark. Your comment is so much appreciated.

19. this week we enjoy photos, night, weather, colour & shade, art & artists, writing & editing, words & letters, birth, health, hands, ink & paint of course… thank you all as always – we will be welcoming Craig Kittner back as guest editor for the month of August… & we are actively seeking new guest editors to join the team – please consider this & send a note on the contact form if you are interested in learning more!

    1. Thank you for including mine and for the great picture prompts!

    2. Dear kj munro –
       My apologies for my late reply…I’ve been out of the loop/ loopy with summer allergies and a bit of melancholy…It is the anniversary of my grandmother’s passing and my late aunt’s birthday…
       Thank you, so much, for publishing my haiku.
       Congratulations to this stellar group of poets. Thank you all! robyn

20. Many thanks for including my verse in your line-up, and for your informative comment, Alan.
    Much appreciated.
    .
    Your verse has a profound tilt, its as if the ‘key’ has a mischief all of its own.

    1. Keys can hold so much mystery, and if this is Kathy’s locker key, what dark secrets might it have access to, I wonder. 😉

       1. I’m sure most of us have a little locker key 🙂

          1. I can’t remember the last time I had a locker key, and it would have been for some changing locker (swim kit or such). I think it was Glasgow in 1994 when I was taken along to the sauna, steam rooms, and those bitter cold pools!
             .
             I did know someone with a Swiss Bank Account, but he said he was just holding it open with about ten dollars. 🙂
             .
             So do you have a locker room stashed away, maybe somewhere in an accessible part of the Welsh Black Mountains? 🙂

             1. Well well, look you now, ‘cough’
                .
                I may have a little one somewhere, but nowhere accessible in them there hills 🙂

             2. haha… it is not my key!!
                it is my photo, though – taken last May at the Dawson Daily News Print & Publishing Festival in Dawson City, Yukon… so glad it provided such inspiration! kj

             3. Hi Kathy,
                I loved the amount of things on the fringe of the photo! In fact Call of the Page held a shahai convo available to our course students touching on this aspect.
                .
                I wonder whose locker key it was? 🙂

21. Dear Katherine,
    thank you for publishing my haiku… it is a pleasure for me.
    Congrats to all the selected!
    Rosa Maria Di Salvatore

22. Thank you, Kathy, for another great selection. Love Margaret Walker’s deep dark / secrets / slowly revealed. Here is my version of darkness and secrets:

    low light
    all the secrets
    we reveal
    (Olivier Schopfer, Failed Haiku 31, July 2018)

    1. Oliver,
       Thank you. I’m so pleased you liked my haiku! It looks like we had very similar thoughts or experiences at some time. I like your take on this as well.

23. .
    THE FIVE QUARTERS OF HAIKU
    .
    by Alan Summers
    .
    .

    If anyone is or was in certain types of health and safety ‘jobs’ you will know we quarter each room, and know what’s beyond, what is ‘outside’. Doors or fire exits may be locked or jammed, and it’s good to know that and any hazards right outside.
    .
    With haiku, if we approach a picture (photograph or painting), or a room, it’s not a bad idea to look at each corner of the room, all four of them, plus that ‘fifth’ quarter, the area or areas ‘outside’ or ‘behind’ or ‘beyond’.
    .
    Any ekphrastic writing might directly be about the artwork in question, or the aspects ‘behind’ the work, whether about the artist or what is left out or ‘behind’. The 5th Quarter is always as valid as any visible or not-so-visible corner, or quarter of a room.
    .
    The photograph has several corners! There is the white board, there are the ‘corners’ of each swipe of the inking device, there is the corners of the room with the blue floor, and of course each floorboard is bound by four corners.
    .
    And of course there is always something lurking or lying deep inside one corner of something at least, whether photograph (think Bladerunner) or any of the ‘framed’ objects/subjects or images.
    .
    Then there is the corners of the photograph itself!
    .
    .
    Beware flashing lights/images!
    .
    .
    Blade Runner Enhance Scene
    “A photograph acts as interface to a 3D space”
    http://www.criticalcommons.org/Members/ironman28/clips/bladeRunner3DphotoH264.mov/view
    .
    Beware flashing lights/images!
    .
    .
    .
    And of course not everything is visible or present in a corner, perhaps the sharp angle of a corner points to something else, in us as much as ‘outside’?
    .
    .
    .
    There was certainly a lot of mention about ‘black’ and ‘dark’ including this wonderful monoku:
    .
    .
    dark matter my mother says not to worry
    .
    Adrian Bouter
    .
    .
    A parent is a parent regardless how old the ‘toddler’ is, whether they are six years or sixty years old! The dark matter might be one of the building blocks of the universe, or one of the disturbing dark matters that too many people in power (crime, politics, corporate activities) engage in, at our own peril, rather than their peril. A mother protects, as they can only do so much, and it would wrong to subject a child to the hidden wrongs of the human world all at once.
    .
    .
    Whole cities flicker with Alfred Booth’s haiku! This author successfully goes beyond one ‘thing’ to many things, but all them, we think, are under night aka nightfall.
    .
    .
     
    cities flicker
    trying to mirror starlight…
    night rolls in
    .
    Alfred Booth
    France
     
    .
    .
    paint roller –
    how my palm print
    fits into grandpa’s
    .
    arvinder kaur
    Chandigarh, India
    .
    .
    A beautful treatment here, very tactile, very physical and inter-generational.
    .
    .

     
    sea glass
    the glow between
    squalls
    .
    B Shropshire
    TX, USA
    .
    .
    Ah, there are always “in-betweenesses” to look for and appreciate. 🙂
    .
    .

    closed grisaille
    the sadness
    behind a smile
    .
    carol jones
    Wales
    .
    .
    Fantastic use of a word for an art technique many of us may have seen sometime, but not realised the name of it. Grisaille is a method of painting in grey monochrome, typically to imitate sculptures.
    .
    Great use of consonance with the ’s’ letters in almost every word!
    .
    .
     
    sumi-e course
    those dark spots
    on his lung
    .
    cezar-florin ciobîcă
    .
    .
    A fantastic use of juxtaposition that projects the reader in a participatory trajectory! This is rich in context and psychological inner journey.
    .
    .
     
    adoption
    re-coloring
    a future
    .
    Claire Vogel Camargo
    .
    .
    Adoption or fostering is a gift to a child bereft of family, and of care and diligence, and love. Wonderful poem.
    .
    .

    art nouveau –
    so little I can hide
    with makeup
    .
    Cristina Angelescu
    Romania
    .
    .
    Wow, what a phrase, and what a reaction or juxtaposition to the opening line. Very strong poem.
    .
    .

    roller primed
    for a first print –
    Bashō’s thousand edits
    .
    Ingrid Baluchi
    Ohrid, Macedonia
    .
    .

    As we know, Matsuo Bashō spent years editing his haikai verses, especially those in his famous haibun. A haiku can be a poem of a thousand cuts, and if anyone says we shouldn’t edit a haiku e ever, or hardly at all, point them to Bashō and his most famous Narrow Road to the Far North haibun!
    .
    .

     

     
    black day
    her dear john letter
    starts to blur
    .
    john hawkhead
     .
    .

    I remember a friend reading tens of thousands of letters for a book, and many of them would have been letters about family members passing away from piracy on the open seas or several world wars from medieval times to the mid-20th century. I’m sure other letters were about romantic losses of the heart as well.
    .
    .
    ink study
    all I see
    when I close my eyes
    .
    Laurie Greer
    Washington DC
    .
    .
    Intriguing! I know if I’ve looked into something bright (external source) and then close my eyes I have a lot of inkblots and my own personal rorschach test. And for those with intricate imaginations, doubtless you see whole countries of the mind unfold.
    .
    .

    ink spots…
    the undefined contours
    of my fears
    .
    macchie d’inchiostro … i contorni indefiniti / delle mie paure
    .
    Lucia Cardillo
    .
    .
    That’s a brilliant line of poetry (or even prose)!
    “the undefined contours of my fears”
    .
    .

     
    antique printing block
    Cinderella’s dress
    fills with moonlight
    .
    Lucy Whitehead
    Essex, UK
    .
    .
    So many of us have had a Cinderella moment, when midnight might reduce our realised dreams to those of rags and tears. I like how I can imagine a printing block reproducing the tale of Cinderella, and through the window come moonbeams full of promise, and a private telling of a story.
    .
    .
     
    deep dark
    secrets
    slowly revealed
    .
    Margaret Walker
    .
    .
    Ah, deep dark, and deep dark secrets, slowly revealed by dawn or another agent? An intriguingly mysterious poem.
    .
    .
    in front of Rothko
    a toddler standing
    on her head
    .
    Marietta McGregor
    .
    .
    The unrestrained honesty of a child! And a great way of fully enjoying a painting! A wonderful poem!!! 🙂
    .
    .
     
    stippled the canvas and the painter
    .
    Marilyn Ashbaugh
    .
    .
    A simple monoku but it has so much inside it. No corner is left unturned.
    .
    .

     
    fading memories
    scrape the canvas
    black and blue
    .
    Mark Gilbert
    UK
    .
    .
    Sadly whenever I read ‘black and blue’ it takes me back to people I’ve met who have been attacked, at home or in the street. The strong verb choice of ‘scrape’ counters and compliments the dual action of ‘fading’. A poignant verse.
    .
    .
     
    highlights and shadows
    the chiaroscuro life
    of my mother
    .
    Mark Meyer
    .
    .
    I love those lines!!! Brilliant poem.
    .
    .
     
    ink brush
    on the night jar’s wing
    a sliver of light
    .
    Martha Magenta
    .
    .
    Utterly and breathtakingly beautiful.
    .
    I’m not sure I’ve witnessed night jars aka nightjars or goat suckers, but seen many a Tawny Frogmouth, a distant relative.
    .
    .
    dusk at the golf club
    part of a marker pole
    a tawny frogmouth
    .
    Alan Summers
    1st Prize, Fellowship of Australian Writers, Queensland, Haiku Competition, June 1995 judged by Janice Bostok
    .
    .

    etaoinshrdlu
    the printer’s devil
    inks the type
    .
    Paul Geiger
    Sebastopol CA
    .
    .

    The language used by the operators of Linotype machines. A private insiders’ joke which would be a devil of a job to understand spoken or “set up”. 🙂
    .
    .
     
    cross-legged
    I touch all the colors
    in the night sky
    .
    Pris Campbell
    .
    .
    A beautifully expansive poem!
    .
    Only last night I was outside watching the sky lit up twice a second by lightning, glorious!
    .
    .
     
    painting on canvas
    day and night
    merge into one
    .
    Radhamani sarma
    .
    .
    Ah, the two corners of the 24 hours period, with the ‘other’ two corners of twilight hours at dawn and dusk. 🙂
    .
    .
     
    indoor repair works
    her way to pronounce
    miscarriage
    .
    Radostina Dragostinova
    Bulgaria
    .
    .
    Incredibly powerful, and deeply poignant. A masterful poem.
    .
    .
     
    tunnel vision
    colour coding my world
    in black and white
    .
    Rashmi Vesa
    .
    .
    Ah, gosh, we do that too often don’t we? Great phrase.
    .
    .
     
    the color of memories indelible ink
    .
    Rich Schilling
    Webster Groves, MO
    .
    .
    A wonderful monoku! 🙂
    .
    I love reading my different versions!!!!
    .
    .

     
    out of the cellar
    my wax drawing
    alive with fish
    .
    Robert Kingston
    Essex, UK
    .
    .
    Love that phrase! I wonder what else escapes the cellar?
    .
    .

     
    dark matter –
    the coming and going
    of melancholy
    .
    robyn brooks
    usa
    .
    .
    Beautifully poignant poem.
    .
    .

    Rorschach inkblot
    lovely butterfly wings
    I lie about
    .
    Sanela Pliško
    .
    .
    Wow! What a brilliant example of juxtaposition, and grasping all five corners.
    .
    .
     
    my teenager
    paints her pink bedroom walls
    black
    .
    Sari Grandstaff
    .
    .
    I’ve seen photos of people having painted walls and ceiling in black and it was nearly impossible to find any furniture, or the door! It’s a great challenge to transform the entirety of a room to black, so congratulations. I bet more than five quarters were covered! 🙂
    .
    .

     
    layer after layer
    covering the present –
    black print of past
    .
    Saša Slavković
    Slovenia
    .
    .
    The abruptness of that last line, withholding an article (a, an, the) or personal pronoun, makes this a powerfully effective poem throughout.
    .
    .
     
    receding shadows the night layers to a footnote
    .
    Shloka Shankar
    .
    .
    I love that ‘the night layers to a footnote’! The whole monoku is a beauty!!!
    .
    .
     
    artist’s proof
    my john hancock
    drawkcab
    .
    simonj
    UK
    .
     
    I remember a few comedy actors or comedians who were practiced at “The language of speaking backwards.” Perhaps all politicians should have to do this, and then perhaps the sheer overwhelming amount of talk for talk’s sake might reduce to an acceptable and practical level.
    .
    .

     
    darkness on the canvas
    trying to walk away
    from myself
    .
    Stephen A. Peters
    .
    .
    Powerful verse!
    .
    .

     
    unfinished work
    the wavering vision
    of yes and no
    .
    Steve Tabb
    San Miguel de Allende, Mexico
    .
    .
    Great last two lines!
    .
    .

     
    paint cans and rollers
    redesigning my space
    for this new dance
    .
    Susan Bonk Plumridge
    London, Canada
    .
    .
    Just love the musicality of the opening line! And the whole poem works beautifully! 🙂
    .
    .

     
    rehab painting day
    the brain-injured boy draws
    his first miracle
    .
    Susan Rogers
    Los Angeles, CA USA
    .
    .
    Outstanding! I’ve worked with adults at a head injury hospital unit. Painting and also writing haiku really helps.
    .
    A beautifully uplifting and crafted poem.
    .
    .
    I wish I could comment on more haiku, but these hours were a rare off-duty time, even on a day off!
    .
    .
    Alan Summers
    Call of the Page

    1. Thanks for commenting on my haiku, Alan. I love your reading of it! 🙂

       1. Thank you!
          .
          .
          I’d love to spend the day, commenting on these haiku including your’s, but I must venture out into the massed light of day. 🙂

    2. Many thanks, Alan, for seeing into my haiku, and your comments. I wasn’t sure it would be understood if one equates lino cutting with editing haiku, but as a scraperboard artist and lino printer, it was easy for me to see the connection. Both need ‘editing’ (adding to/cutting out) to achieve their final form.

       1. Dear Ingrid,
          .
          roller primed
          for a first print –
          Bashō’s thousand edits
          .
          Ingrid Baluchi
          Ohrid, Macedonia
          .
          .
          I love linocuts, and I jointly held a few exhibitions with Trevor Hadrell, where he designed cocktail recipes in linocut for the Floating Nightclub Exhibition, as well as for my lime quarter haiku etc…
          https://area17.blogspot.com/2013/03/lime-quarter-sixth-day-haiku-poetry.html
          .
          I’m astonished how you linocut artists can do either small works so accurately, or massive city scenes!

    3. Alan,
       Thank you for your comments about my haiku and all of the others on which you commented. Another wonderful learning experience from you!

       1. Thank you Margaret, and I’m delighted you are still enjoying your deftly crafted minimalist haiku!
          🙂

    4. Always enjoy your comments in Dialogs, Alan. Thanks for mentioning mine among an extraordinary set of far-ranging poems. Cheers!

       1. Dear Mark,
          It was an exceptional haiku, with its crafted phrasing, thank you! 🙂

    5. Alan,
       Thank you for your comment on mine. So many you could have chosen. KJM certainly gives us plenty to submerge ourselves in.
       Thank you for the five corner tip.
       Love your entry into your analysis through your own turning keys ku.
       Best wishes
       Rob

       1. Rob,
          .
          .

          out of the cellar
          my wax drawing
          alive with fish
          .
          Robert Kingston
          Essex, UK
          .
          .
          There were a lot of other good haiku, and I hope others will commentate on them, as this webpage is all about haiku dialogue, and I look forward to that.
          .
          I systematically went through each haiku, and looked for certain things, including a mention of a room, or something that might have what we perceive to have four corners or four quarters.
          .
          I really liked the suggestion of the vividness and sheen of the wax crayon drawing of fish that were rising from the cellar just as salmon rise when the rivers are in spate.
          .
          But also ‘cellar’ can additionally be metaphorical or symbolic of something within us that is good and wishes to surface.
          .
          It certainly contains a lot of resonance as I’ve read the haiku many times now, and it increases in its ‘movement’ as a haiku.

    6. seeping light
       *~(*)-
       his fingertips find the words
       _^~*
       in our braille

       Always insightful Alan, and always bringing new perspectives. Hope to catch up soon.

       1. John,
          .
          .
          black day
          her dear john letter
          starts to blur
          .
          john hawkhead
          .
          .
          My middle is John, on both occasions, although I’m addressed by two different ‘given’ names. The poem feels so sad, and I worry what the black day was, and if things ever got back to some level of happiness or contentment.
          .
          Moon is also a beautiful braille system and Felix Dennis had this made into poetry books when he was doing his wine cellar tour by helicopter. Both systems as communication must be amazing, to physically have words move under our fingertips, even in utter darkness, metaphorically and literally.
          .
          My favourite haunts are The Angel and The Rivo, and the latter is, as you might know, around five or six minutes from the train station if Siemens take you there one fine day. And the ‘Nam station cafe is pretty darned fine too! 🙂
          .
          warmest regards,
          Alan

    7. Thanks Alan,for your comments on my poem and on all the others. Somehow it all remains kind of incomplete without your commentary that we look forward to each week. Thanks kj for wonderful pictures every week and for including my poems. I thoroughly enjoy this blog. Best,arvinder

       1. Dear Arvinder,
          .
          .
          paint roller –
          how my palm print
          fits into grandpa’s
          .
          arvinder kaur
          Chandigarh, India
          .
          .
          That’s also a lovely line break/enjambment where you’ve artfully withheld the verb until the final line. Great haiku! 🙂

    8. Thanks for your comment, Alan!
       honored by your attention.

       1. Thank you, that is very kind of you.
          .
          .
          ink spots…
          the undefined contours
          of my fears
          .
          macchie d’inchiostro … i contorni indefiniti / delle mie paure
          .
          Lucia Cardillo
          .
          .
          Wonderful!

    9. Alan
       .
       Claire Camargo has pulled a deep meaningful haiku from the abstraction of the picture.
       .
       Adoption may well bring to mind humans, but to know Claire is to know her devotion to adopting pets, especially dogs, into healthy families.
       .
       Claire’s haiku has enough white space (in all that is dark surrounding it) to allow several reads.
       .
       A seasoned haiku, indeed!
       .
       Jan in Texas

       1. Dear Jan,

          Thank you so much for your insightful comments on my haiku “adoption…” addressed to Alan. Your reading and interpretation of more than one layer is gratifying and instructive. And true.

          Thanks much,

          Claire

    10. Thank you Alan for including my haiku in such excellent company.

        1. I really enjoyed your haiku!
           .
           .
           cities flicker
           trying to mirror starlight…
           night rolls in
           .
           Alfred Booth
           France
           .
           .
           Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we could just see those star systems we attempt to replicate in soulless office windows though?

    11. Dear Alan,

        Thank you for your “Five Quarters” of haiku presentation. Good for several more reads and application.

        Happy that Kathy Munro included my haiku. A big thank you for your kindness in commenting on my haiku:
        adoption
        re-coloring
        a future

        Something that in my mind applies not just to people, but to animals too.

        Much appreciated,
        Claire

    12. Dear Alan –
        I hope that it is never too late for a heartfelt and sincere thank you…
        Thank you so very much for your kind words about my poem. I have been dealing with the enormous loss of my female elders…trying to sort out my own dark matter. I truly appreciate it.☺️ robyn

24. Kathy–thank you so much for the inclusion–this was fun with flashbacks of art school many years ago. Looking forward to a great afternoon of reading!!

25. Perhaps like Jackie Chou’s
    .
    writer’s block/my brain a dark canvas/of wordless thoughts
    .
    and Laurie Greer’s
    .
    ink study/all I see/when I close my eyes
    .
    I imagined this photo would be difficult to translate into a poem. But none of it! What an amazing variety!
    Particularly liked the two above, along with Barbara Tate’s humorous comment on the color black:
    .
    abstract/off to lunch for a /brighter future
    .
    Adrian Bouter’s comforting
    .
    dark matter my mother says not to worry
    .
    and recognized something similar in my own childhood in Vandana Parashar’s lovely
    .
    dark chocolate/all the goodness beneath/dad’s firmness.
    .
    What a pleasure to be among you all. Thank you Kathy!

    1. Thank you Ingrid. This was fun.

26. Thanks dear Kathy for adding my haiku to this beautiful collection on photo theme Ink. An array of emotions and dialogue. Congrats to those works are selected.

27. I ink, therefore I am…

    By the time I get through all of these haiku I suspect my fingers (and mind) will be inky with the all the images presented. A quick glance at some of them finds humor, poignancy, depth, and more.

    Thank you for including mine in this grouping, KJ. I feel honored to be among this stalwart group of poets.

28. I am so glad to be among those who got selected.. enjoyed all.of them, congratulations, all.

    Anitha Varma.

29. Thank you, dear Kathy, for choosing my haiku work! Congratulations to all worthy haikuists!

30. Kathy, thank-you for publishing my haiku. It is always a pleasure to be published in this column.

31. Thanks for choosing mine, Kathy. Wow, what an amazingly rich selection of haiku. I think this is my favourite week so far. I love so many of them. Fascinating to see what has come out of the contemplation of black ink.

32. Who would have though so much humour, sadness, psychology and memories could be portrayed by one small inky patch, an amazing read.
    .
    Thank you so much for including one of mine Kathy, appreciated.

33. Dear Kathy,
    Greetings. Thankfully delighted to see my haiku in this colorful forum; My eyes are dipped in so many paintings. Going through one by one all the wonderful word paintings.
    with regards
    S.RADHAMANI

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