Poet Profile

Ferris Gilli

Ferris Gilli's work in haiku and related genres has appeared regularly in eminent haiku journals for over thirteen years. Ferris conducted the on-line Hibiscus School of Western Traditional Haiku (sponsored by the World Haiku Club) from January 2001 to April 2002. From 2001 to 2004, she was editor of “Treetops,” a haiku column in World Haiku Review. Her twelve-lesson guide Exploring Haiku was translated into Romanian for use in the Romanian Educational System. She is an associate editor of The Heron's Nest.

Awards and Other Honors: First Place, The 1998 Alabama Sakura Competition; Fourth Place, The 1999 Alabama Sakura Competition; Third Prize, The 1998 Herb Barrett Contest; Honorable Mention, The1999 Herb Barrett Contest; First Prize, the 2000 Florida State Poets Sijo Contest; Winner or Runner-up in the Snapshot Press Haiku Calendar Competitions 2000, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, and 2010; among the ten winners of the 2nd and 3rd Annual International People's Haiku and Senryu Contest; Honorable Mention, The Yuki Teikei Haiku Society East-West 99 Hokku Contest, The 1999 Harold G. Henderson Awards, and The National League of American Pen Women Poetry Contest; Grand Prize, The Heron's Nest Valentine's Awards 2001; Grand Prize (with Peggy Willis Lyles and Paul MacNeil) and Second Place (with Mark Brooks), 2000 Bernard Lionel Einbond Renku Competition; Second Place (with Peggy Willis Lyles and Paul MacNeil), 2001 Bernard Lionel Einbond Renku Competition; Grand Prize (with Peggy Willis Lyles and Paul MacNeil), 2004 Lionel Einbond Renku Competition; Grand Prize ( with Peggy Willis Lyles and Paul MacNeil), 2008 Lionel Einbond Renku Competition; Grand Prize (with Paul MacNeil, Ron Moss, and Matthew Paul), 2010 Lionel Einbond Renku Competition; Best U.S. Poem, The 2008 Vancouver Cherry Blossom Festival Invitational; Second Prize, The Ten Thousand Cranes Haiku Contest 2008; haiku exhibited at The 16th annual Honolulu Festival of the Arts 2010.

Books Published: Shaped by the Wind (Waterloo, Liverpool, Great Britain: Snapshot Press 2006).

summer stars
a hint of clover
in the bull's breath

the visible pulse
of a baby's soft spot . . .
wren answering wren

the way he leans
into her whisper . . .
a mallard's wingbeats

her son’s enlistment
dogwood blossoms
scatter in the wind

last night's rain
cupped in the banana leaf
a small green frog

autumn deepens
a fish slides down
the cormorant's throat

Credits: (first publication) "summer stars" - Dandelion Wind (Haiku North America Conference Anthology, 2007); "the way he leans" - The Haiku Calendar 2008 (Snapshot Press); "last night's rain" - The Heron's Nest II:4 (2000); "the visible pulse" - tinywords (9/11/2007); "her son's enlistment" - Notes from the Gean Vol. I:1 (2009); "autumn deepens" - The Heron's Nest VI:11 (2004).