HAIKU DIALOGUE – Music Around the World – From apprentice to master or how to walk the path of music – long list

Music Around the World with Guest Editor Deborah Karl-Brandt

Hi guys, it’s me again. Over the next few weeks, we’ll be immersing ourselves in music together. There is a variety of instruments, rhythms and melodies to explore around the globe. Ancient Chinese music is based on a five-tone system and the guqin had an almost religious significance. Waka and later the tanka are basically songs. The mother’s steady heartbeat calms the baby in the womb and can be compared to the rhythm of a drum. Music is the language that everyone can connect with, even without understanding the meaning of the words being sung. It speaks directly to our hearts. I would like to invite everyone to explore the world of music with me in these prompts.

Below is Deborah’s selection of poems on the topic From apprentice to master or how to walk the path of music:

Music: River And Clouds Flowing in My Heart (云水禅心) – Tank Drum

totally tone-deaf
but I still keep practicing
under the shower

Mirela Brailean
Iasi, Romania

 

first piano lesson
practicing
straight back

Martina Matijević
Vidovci, Croatia

 

a talent wasted
I leave my viola
on the train

Penny Lowery
Devon, UK

 

spring again
frog song
emerging from the mud

Stephen A. Peters
Bellingham, WA

 

we’re in bed!
night clarinet practice
stops abruptly

Pris Campbell
U.S.

 

the glittering silver cover
of my rock’n’roll songbook –
piano lessons

Anne Curran
Hamilton, New Zealand

 

vintage songs
I would have loved
to be a hippie

Marie Derley
Ath, Belgium

 

first piano lesson
I’m looking for
the note of silence

Vladislav Hristov
Bulgaria

 

childhood fun
a comb and thin paper
home-made kazoo

Luciana Moretto
Italy

 

the walk to school
learning to whistle
to answer the birds

Keith Evetts
Thames Ditton, UK

 

living room
filled with live music
I shake an egg

Eavonka Ettinger
Long Beach, CA

 

practice room door
cracked open
a flurry of arpeggios

Lee Hudspeth
United States

 

she quit playing
the day the piano died
in my mother’s womb

Jackie Chou
Pico Rivera, California

 

For River —
finally, the piano
lends me its voice

Sean Murphy
North Beach, MD

 

retirement
rusty arpeggios
from the forgotten guitar

Keiko Izawa
Japan

 

weary blues
wind plucks a diddley bow
through cornfields

John Zheng
Mississippi

 

a smile through tears
starting over
the Moonlight sonata

Boryana Boteva
Bulgaria

 

High-heeled ladies pass—
the old street musician
tunes his violin.

Herwig Stas
Meldert

 

winter nocturne
I lose track of time
with the piano teacher

Dejan Ivanovic
Lazarevac, Serbia

 

crickets chirp faster to match my banjo picking

Dan Campbell
Virginia

 

school festival
here and there
kulintang tunes

Anthony Rabang
Philippines

 

twilight
my heart unwinds
into the flute

Nisha Raviprasad
India

 

fifty years on …
dad’s old guitar and me
get in tune at last

Natalia Kuznetsova
Russia

 

drumming
my feet plant
a lightning rod

Joanna Ashwell
UK

 

playing the gogona
grandma lisps a song
about an old lover

(Gogona – A musical instrument made out of bamboo. One end of the gogona is held down by the teeth while the fingers are used to stroke the other end to produce music. It is a kind of jaw harp.)

Jahnavi Gogoi
Ajax, Ontario, Canada

 

his flute my song
wilt thou be my dearie
our wedding vows

Kathabela Wilson
USA

 

harmonium practice—
my old fingers tune
a new song

Neena Singh
India

 

hillbilly band warming up
a young boy plays along
on his toy guitar

Al Gallia
Lafayette Louisiana USA

 

marching band rehearsals
the fleeting glances
of two flautists

Daniela Misso
Italy

 

cascading guitar strums my zen

Barbara Anna Gaiardoni
Verona, Italy

 

pink-budding hedges
around our new home
♫ Que Sera, Sera ♫

Maxianne Berger
Outremont, Quebec

 

opening the door
to a bigger world
little ukulele

Bryan Rickert
Belleville, Illinois

 

a gift of
guitar grit
punk mix

John Pappas
USA

 

rediscovery
my hands haven’t forgotten
playing the cello

Miluše Míčková
The Czech Republic

 

pan flute
a few steps that I never
managed to climb

Ivan Georgiev
Germany

 

sitar class
a sparrow’s trill
completes the raga

Nitu Yumnam
UAE

 

first flute lesson
where on earth am I
supposed to put my fingers ?

Olivier Schopfer
Geneva, Switzerland

 

old pianist
his hands remember
what time forgot

oude pianist
zijn handen herinneren zich
wat de tijd vergat

Guido De Pelsmaeker
België (Holsbeek)

 

catching crickets–
the vibration
of a cello string

Laurie Greer
Washington, DC

 

she masters a final arpeggio quits

Kay Schwartz
Michigan, USA

 

metro station
I sing to petal faces
for my supper

Jenny Shepherd
London, UK

 

the strums of veena
in sync with heart beat
healing prep

Lakshmi Iyer
India

 

november rain
the art of listening
to our old songs

Eva Limbach
Germany

 

first piano lesson –
my palms are learning to hold
apple made of air

Goda Virginija Bendoraitienė
Lithuania

 

first drumbeat …
mother’s heartbeat
still inside

Vijay Prasad
Patna, India

 

grandma’s piano
the stillness of
the attic

Mohammad Azim Khan
Peshawar Pakistan

 

first day at dance class
the children assume
I’m the teacher

Baisali Chatterjee Dutt
India

 

piano lessons
who he wants me to be…

Margaret Mahony
Australia

 

autumn breeze
finding on the recorder
my forgotten voice

Minal Sarosh
Ahmedabad, India

 

a deep breath
of jasmine-scented air
writing my first song

Louise Hopewell
Australia

 

adagio
the spillway of fiddle
from empty theatre

Zoltan Pachnik
Hungary

 

all thumbs
coaxing mountain melodies
from a gourd harp

Shannon Blood
United States

 

the rhythm of my violin
bringing my heart
to the twenties

Swarna Bopali de Zoysa
Sri Lanka

 

mridangam
left behind by son
thrumming heartstrings…

(Mridangam is a wooden double sided drum.)

Raji Vijayaraghavan
India

 

drifting between
passion and serenity
the soul of a ‘cello

Karina Klesko
New Mexico, USA

 

karaoke night
select a real rock song
fat bottom girls

Veronica Hosking
Avondale, AZ

 

Aussie pub concert
the band leading the crowd
chant the chorus

wanda amos
Old Bar, Australia

 

childhood sheet music
a gold star from grandma
on each page

Wendy Cobourne
Homestead, Florida

 

open / close
the screen door’s squeal
learning the descant

Rachel Greve
Wisconsin, USA

 

violin
in sister’s footsteps
unfit feet

Christa Pandey
Austin, TX, USA

 

my bluest blues
on slide guitar
his memorial

Mark Meyer
Mercer Island WA USA

 

teenage kicks
revisited —
the joys of heavy metal

Melissa Dennison
UK

 

flute practice
the Thames river’s
rise and fall

Lori Kiefer
UK

 

memory ward–
hollow eyes brighten
to vinyl show tunes

Gary Evans
Stanwood, Washington, US

 

my talking drum
made of tin
human again

Mark Gilbert
UK

 

all these years
my violin still refuses
to trust me

Nalini Shetty
Mumbai, India

 

er hu music
on the street corner
a child listens

Herbert Shippey
Tifton, Georgia

 

flute practice—
a wood thrush flies
out of a cracked note

Adele Evershed
Wilton, CT

 

lo-fi music
the baby’s
first kick

Geetha Ravichandran
Chennai, India

 

black sky-
I sink
into a guitar’s wound

Rashmi Mohapatra
Mumbai, India

 

unplucked strings…
mother’s veena
too fall silent

Madhuri Pillai
Australia

 

forest –
in the foliage the wind
polyphonic

Dan C. Iulian
Romania

 

shakuhachi…
the sound of your voice
empties my mind

Rita Melissano
Rock Island, IL USA

 

sārīs ashimmer . . .
grandma’s gramophone
lamenting summer

Monica Kakkar
India

 

children’s piano –
scattered in the seasons
ringing chords

Stoianka Boianova
Bulgaria

 

through memory
I take shape in his arms…
the violinist

Fatma Zohra Habis
Algeria

 

driftwood
bobbing up and down
my lullaby

Kavita Ratna
India

 

family whip round
his birthday guitar
still in the loft

Robert Kingston
Chelmsford, UK

 

in solitude
the mockingbird’s song—
writer’s block

Arvinder Kaur
Chandigarh India

 

reverting
to my native tongue–
song without words

Cynthia Anderson
Yucca Valley, California

 

open window
children’s voices chanting
a jump rope rhyme

Valentina Ranaldi-Adams
Fairlawn, Ohio USA

 

never
reaching the harbor
whale song

Roberta Beach Jacobson
Indianola, IA, USA

 

autumn koel
her panchama
echoes mine

(In Hindustani classical music, panchama is a melodious raga that evokes peace and tranquility.)

Daya Bhat
India

 

grandson on drums
music to my ears
I chose sport

Carol Reynolds
Australia

 

night wind her love song grows dim

Richa Sharma
India

 

the rock stars we thought we’d be groupies

Anne Fox
Broomes Island, MD USA

 

roots of rhythm
a woodpecker
drums the morning

marilyn ashbaugh
usa

 

interlude
the notes wait
in the sax

Ravi Kiran
Hyderabad, India

 

playing the keys
on mum’s piano
I still feel her touch

Annie Wilson
Shropshire, UK

 

showerhead
wannabe singer’s
microphone

Stephen J. DeGuire
Los Angeles, CA

 

ode to joy
her son picks
the guitar

Madeleine Kavanagh
Northern California

 

learning meditation
the length of
my singing bowl
tone

Sangita Kalarickal
United States

 

cameras flash
her reclaiming of notes
after a chide

Sumitra Kumar
India

 

rachmaninov 2:
my life unfolds
on the score

Cristina Povero
Italy

 

end of the war-
from a roofless house
sounds of the piano

Anica Marcelic
Zapresic, Croatia

 

always an alto
in children’s chorus
i must sing with boys

Margie Gustafson
Lombard, IL USA

 

high school talent show
we play Mary Had a Little Lamb
on beer bottles

nancy brady
huron, ohio

 

60th birthday
like a virgin in my hands
this guitar

Maya Daneva
The Netherlands

 

two left feet
she finds a rhythm
all her own

Jenn Ryan-Jauregui
Tucson Arizona USA

 

school dance band
the fifth best trumpet
can handle the lights

Richard Straw
Cary, North Carolina

 

cold sound
of the teacher’s rod –
piano lesson

Mircea Moldovan
România

 

still believing i can improvise on harmonica my he(art)

Pegah Rahmati Nezhad
Tehran, Iran

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.