Poet Profile

Diana Webb

Diana has been writing haiku for around 30 years. She edits the print journal Time Haiku and runs her local haiku group Leaves to Tree Haiku Group. She particularly enjoys writing haibun and has been the guest editor of Drifting Sands Haibun and also devised and run haibun workshops for both the British Haiku Society and her local general poetry group Mole Valley Poets. Before discovering haiku Diana published several short books for primary school age children and is now turning her attention to writing picture book texts alongside her haibun and haiku work. She believes there is a connection between them. Composing haiku and haibun to enhance mental health is a special interest.

Awards and Other Honors:

Grand Prix Genjuan Haibun Contest 2016; British Haiku Society Award winner of haibun section 2011; the Museum of Haiku Literature Award (2005, 2018); The Haiku Calendar Competition winner (for March, 2020), Snapshot Press.

Books Published:

White Coat on a Peg - The Magic Pen Press (May 2021); Rites and Relics - Hub Editions (2019); Traces and Thresholds - Hub Editions (2018); Pocketing the Tide - Alba Publishing (2013); Takeaway - Hub Editions (2010); The Wood Not Entered - Hub Editions (2009); Already Along the Stream - Hub Editions (2005); Stilling the Pen - Hub Editions (1999); Dancing Stones - Hub Editions (1998).

first snowflake
yet to settle 
an egret in flight

coffee brewing
a blackbird skims
a roof of snow

afternoon river
in palest jade
a sculpted frog

almost dawn
in a streetlamp's light
vermilion leaves

back here again
that same old pigeon
in the rain

woodsmoke and violets
the overcast quiet
of this day

Credits:

“first snowflake” - hedgerow #134, Spring 2021; coffee brewing” - tsuri-dōrō Issue #3, May/June 2021; “afternoon river” - Blithe Spirit Vol. 31, No. 2, 2021; “almost dawn” - Blithe Spirit, Vol. 31 No. 1, 2021; “back here again” - Presence #68, November 2020; “woodsmoke and violets” - The Haiku Calendar Snapshot Press, March 2021.