HAIKU DIALOGUE – Intoxication – Sports – long list

Intoxication with Guest Editor Deborah Karl-Brandt

It has been with us since time immemorial, and almost all of us have experienced it firsthand: intoxication. Endorphins produced in the body during exercise give us a feeling of happiness known as a “runner’s high,” and once again we are intoxicated. Intoxicants have been used to awaken our spirituality, make us forget physical hardships, or elevate our imagination to unprecedented heights. And yet intoxication has its dark side. In the coming weeks, we want to explore how legal intoxicants affect us, our brains, and our everyday lives. I invite you to join me on a journey into our everyday lives and our brains to explore intoxication.

Below is Deborah’s selection of poems on the topic of Sports:

Early dawn
insistent pitch of the ball
against silent walls

Sudha Devi Nayak
Bhubaneswar India

 

punishment running
the PE teacher gives up
before we do

Jenny Shepherd
London, UK

 

I touch the pool end
count another length –
thoughts of home

Anne Curran
New Zealand

 

deadlifts–
the song of gravel
all the way home

Arvinder Kaur
Chandigarh India

 

daily pilgrimage
my 10,000 steps
to heaven

Kathabela Wilson
USA

 

uphill trek
both dogs panting
less than me

Kanjini Devi
The Far North, Aotearoa NZ

 

walk around the block
cardiac recovery
step by step

Kathleen Mazurowski
Chicago, IL

 

after chemo
my first walk around the block
a marathon

Peggy Hale Bilbro
Alabama

 

treadmill running miles away

Olivier Schopfer
Geneva, Switzerland

 

reminiscing
about that girl on a bike
braids flying

Jenn Ryan-Jauregui
Tucson, Arizona USA

 

feet pumping
last night’s wine fades
from my brain

Pris Campbell
US

 

cycling uphill—
my childhood legs
knew how

Sebastian Revon
Ireland

 

second best runner
in the class
…still feel the feeling

Margaret Mahony
Australia

 

morning jog —
along lovers’ lane
a nightingale’s song

Minko Tanev
Bulgaria

 

jogging —
only dog collar’s jingle
in step with me

Nazarena Rampini
Italia

 

night joggers–
ilangilang scent
drowns the moon

Federico C. Peralta
Bulacan, Philippines

 

overtaking me—
the jogger’s
fabric conditioner

Tony Williams
Scotland, UK

 

octagenarian
upright on marathon spikes
evening walk

Ashoka Weerakkody
Colombo, Sri Lanka

 

for every pose
that i couldn’t perfect
shavaasana

Anju Kishore
Bengaluru, India

 

ovation updraft
the Swan Queen’s
encore

Lorraine A. Padden
San Diego, California

 

blue horizon…
I wake up repenting
alongside Jonah

Mircea Moldovan
România

 

an old dream –
after swimming
ready to fly

Ana Drobot
Romania

 

the runner
hook slides past the plate
his hand touches home

John S Green
Bellingham, Washington

 

miles after miles
feel-feel not
my body

Rita R. Melissano
Rock Island, IL USA

 

tango fever
my red dress takes control
of the night

Anne Fox
USA

 

drawing the bow
muscles straining—
a miss

Patricia Haddock
San Francisco, USA

 

mountain climbing…
breathing in sky
breathing out clouds

Adele Evershed
Wilton, Connecticut

 

restless to climb
every mountain I can see
Mt Difficult summit

Louise Hopewell
Australia

 

mountain peak
we pass the flask
through a cloud

Lori Kiefer
UK

 

running 10 laps
tahô vendor
at the finish line

Anthony Rabang
Philippines

 

the perfect stroke
miles and miles
of mind-floats

Joanna Ashwell
United Kingdom

 

marathon
I leave behind competitors
I leave behind worries

Mirela Brailean
Iasi, Romania

 

wild staccato
unleashing
of my heart

Nadejda Kostadinova
Bulgaria

 

parkrun
nothing in my head
but breath

C.X. Turner
U.K.

 

dreamscape…
being chased
I outrun them all

Nancy Brady
Huron, Ohio

 

flat out of breath
at the marathon—
too much cheering

Maxianne Berger
Outremont, Quebec

 

at the finish line
blessing my empty bladder
drizzly morning

Ivan Georgiev
Germany

 

changing horses mid-race menopause

susan burch
Hagerstown, MD

 

runner’s block
the poet
and the marathon

Mike Fainzilber
Tel Aviv, Israel

 

childrens sport
kicking goals
in the field of life

Carol Reynolds
Australia

 

brimful bay . . .
beating the blues
barefoot

Monica Kakkar
India and United States of America

 

col fiato corto
fin dove si spalanca il cielo-
farfalla d’aria

with shortness of breath
as far as the sky opens –
air butterfly

Giuliana Ravaglia
Bologna (Italia)

 

practicing kata
over and over
imaginary foes

(In martial arts, kata is a rehearsed, continuous pattern of movements. It is performed to practice defensive and offensive techniques, balance, and breathing.)

Debbie Feller
USA

 

Pacific surf
riding high
on the last wave

Ruth Holzer
Potomac Falls, VA

 

my only rush
in sport…
crazy golf hole-in-one

Tracy Davidson
Warwickshire, UK

 

a break in the clouds —
after weeks of depression
gym class helps a bit

Sean Murphy
MD, USA

 

the ducks
are giving us the side-eye
outdoor gym

Marie Derley
Ath, Belgium

 

finally …
the Tiger’s Nest
my steps quicken

Susan Farner
USA

 

riding the roaring waves for hours no more competing pressure

Lakshman Bulusu
Princeton, NJ, USA

 

the challenge
red line to cross
and they’re off

Luciana Moretto
Italy

 

breath in breeze
as the road slips away
i soar

Melissa Dennison
UK

 

rock climbing
finally reaching
cloud nine

thomas david
United Kingdom

 

runner’s high—
the road unwinds
beneath my feet

Neena Singh
India

 

morning run
after awhile the haze lifts
the sky in me bluer

Stephen A. Peters
Bellingham, WA

 

fortieth kilometer –
taking a breath
five meters further

Artur Zieliński
Poland

 

afternoon angling
the fish wave
as they pass by

Vera Kochanowsky
Falls Church, Virginia USA

 

long-distance run —
on the horizon shines
a paradise island

Stoianka Boianova
Bulgaria

 

decades old –
the joy and thrill
of biking downhill

Dan Campbell
Virginia

 

on the pavement
among discarded books
– an exercise bike

Dejan Ivanovic
Lazarevac, Serbia

 

pull-ups —
the giggles strengthen
our height

Lakshmi Iyer
India

 

mountain track
gossamer clouds carry me
to the flagpole

Milan Rajkumar
Imphal, India

 

sprinting stallion
her tresses in the wind
a boundless stream

Sheikha A.
United Arab Emirates

 

marathon
forgetting our
allergies

Roberta Beach Jacobson
Indianola, US

 

learning swimming
the sudden gasp
for life

Nisha Raviprasad
India

 

runner’s high—
my heartbeat outruns
the morning sun

Sathya Venkatesh
Coimbatore, India

 

the high—
breasting the tape
after 26.2 miles

Subir Ningthouja
Imphal, India

 

the pause
between my steps . . .
the Hillary Step

(Hillary Step is the steep snow wall below the summit of Mount Everest. It is the final and the toughest push, also called the ‘death zone’.)

Padma Rajeswari
Hyderabad, India

 

slipping out –
past the
peloton

Tim Chamberlain
Tokyo, Japan

 

finishing line
i tell myself
i’m already there

Baisali Chatterjee Dutt
India

 

toned muscle
I stare longingly
into the fridge

Patricia Hawkhead
UK

 

padma asana
after decades —
a rain-soaked petunia

Rashmi Buragohain
India

 

watermelon red sun begins to sweat

Kavita Ratna
India

 

I only
hyperventilate
runner’s low

Eavonka Ettinger
Long Beach, CA

 

beads of sweat
I run to hit
the shuttlecock

Tuyet Van Do
Australia

 

long bike ride
too steep to climb
the porch steps

Richard Straw
Cary, North Carolina

 

off -the -mark
the next goal
already netted

Geetha Ravichandran
India

 

huffing and puffing —
waiting on the endorphins
to kick in

Mark Meyer
Mercer Island WA USA

 

planks … my mind stays in the present

Sumitra Kumar
India

 

deep woods stroll
lost in the spiral
of the snail’s shell

Kerry J Heckman
Seattle, WA

 

dawn swim …
all the way home
I float on air

Annie Wilson
Shropshire, UK

 

one free throw
after another, after another
winter dusk

Bruce Feingold
Berkeley, CA USA

 

bicycle wheel spokes
all my problems are spinning
faster and faster

Urszula Marciniak
Poland

 

childhood soccer
in the monsoon field
envying myself

Biswajit Mishra
Canada

 

mountain trail
the push of the hand
I held walking

Nitu Yumnam
UAE

 

becoming aware
of awareness . . .
qigong

Valentina Ranaldi-Adams
Fairlawn, Ohio USA

 

every life event
clicking into place
morning tai chi

Jahnavi Gogoi
Ajax, Ontario, Canada

 

for a little while
my body forgets the earth –
in the pool’s clear blue

Goda Virginija Bendoraitienė
Lithuania

 

rowing the boat
in moonlit night
soothes my wearyness

Swarna Bopali de Zoysa
Sri Lanka

 

playing sudoku
one more and one more
bird song at dawn

Tsanka Shishkova
Sofia, Bulgaria

 

a breath from
snell’s window closing
free diver

Stephen J. DeGuire
Los Angeles, CA

 

boot camp
marching in step
with the sunrise

Barrie Levine
Massachusetts, USA

 

runner’s high
over the hills
helium sunrise

Orense Nicod
Paris, France

 

lotus pose. . .
leaving the earth
beneath me

Margaret Anderson
Vancouver, BC

 

tai chi circle
the whole moon
in one footprint

Sandip Chauhan
USA

 

final hurdle —
my legs levitate
with the breeze

Vaishnavi Ramaswamy
India

 

tintinnabulum
wind chimes play as I pedal
to nowhere

Veronica Hosking
Avondale, AZ

 

stone steps
to a mountaintop shrine
day moon

Keiko Izawa
Japan

 

savasana
together
in linden scent

Sanjana Zorinc
Croatia

 

mile three
beyond
to lift off
beginning

Ann Sullivan
Arlington, MA

 

black line
breath, stroke… breath, stroke…
the rush

Morgan Ophir
Sydney, Australia

 

swimming pool echoes
the strangenesses heard
in amniotic canals

John Hawkhead
Bradford on Avon, UK

 

saving myself
for the straight 兎 a hare
from nowhere

simonj
UK

 

swimming through clouds with Zephyr

Victor Ortiz
Bellingham, WA

 

yearend
walk river into
full moon

John Zheng
Mississippi

Join us next week for Deborah’s commentary on additional poems…

Bios

Guest Editor Deborah Karl-Brandt lives in Sinzig, Germany, with her husband, two rabbits and numerous books. After her PhD studies in Scandinavian languages and literatures, she works as a freelance author and poet. Her poems have appeared in magazines like 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 explores Chinese and Japanese novels.

Assistant Editor Lafcadio, a former teacher, now works from home writing, editing and proofreading study guides for nursing textbooks. She lives in Tennessee. She has written poetry for a long time but a couple of years ago fell in love with Japanese micropoetry and hasn’t looked back. Lafcadio has been published in a number of journals and anthologies. She writes under the nom de plume of Lafcadio because nom de plume is so fun to say. You can read her poems on Twitter (X) @lafcadiopoetry or BlueSky @lafcadiobsky.

Assistant Editor Vandana Parashar is an associate editor of haikuKATHA and one of the editors of Poetry Pea and #FemkuMag. Her debut e-chapbook, I Am, was published by Title IX Press (now Moth Orchid Press) in 2019 and her second chapbook Alone, I Am Not, was published by Velvet Dusk Publishing in April 2022.

Lori Zajkowski is the Post Manager for Haiku Dialogue. She lives in New York City and enjoys reading and writing haiku.

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

Portrait by Laurel Parry

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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.  Read past Haiku Dialogue posts here.