Renku Sessions

The Renku Sessions: New Calendar 19

renkuchainWelcome to The Haiku Foundation’s Fifth Renku Session: New Calendar. I am John Stevenson, leading my second Kasen (36 verse) renku on this site. We will be trying something a little different this time. Instead of making all of the selections myself, new verses will be selected by the poet who wrote the preceding verse. This will be on a voluntary basis and I remain ready to preform this task for anyone who prefers to pass up the opportunity.

This week’s selection and commentary is compliments of Polona Oblak.:

in full flight
fledglings skim
through the archway

      1. –Barbara A. Taylor

“With our renku turning the halfway page the miracle of faith becomes a miracle of nature as a new generation of birds (swallows, perhaps?) takes to the sky. We are not told where the archway is situated, what it supports or whether it is a part of a sacred building or not, and it doesn’t really matter. It is all about the freedom to flee, to go wherever the heart or mind or instinct takes you. I am also reminded of the arches of the feet that wore the boots in the preceding verse.

One reservation I had about this verse was that it would be the fifth mention of an animal, and only four verses after the pair featuring a flying insect and its larva. However, the context in which these animals appear is never the same so I think there is nothing here to impede the forward movement of the renku.

Thank you, Barbara, for a beautiful verse, and thanks to THF and John in particular for making all this possible.”

Thank you, Polona and congratulations, Barbara!

Barbara A. Taylor will be offered the opportunity to select the next verse. Barbara, please contact me, either in a reply below (if your computer interface issues have been resolved) or by e-mail (ithacan@earthlink.net) to let me know whether you accept this offer. If you do, I will ask you to choose the next verse in accordance with the requirements listed below and to write a paragraph or two about your selection and send it to me on Wednesday morning (May 17) so that I can incorporate it in the next posting, which appears on the following day. If you would rather not make the selection, I will do so, but I would prefer to know that I’ll be doing that as early as possible

Verse twenty will be a non-seasonal verse, in two lines. This will be the first in a series of three non-seasonal verses. This section should provide us with an opportunity to explore some topics and diction that haven’t yet been included in our renku.

Verse twenty must link to the nineteenth verse (and only the nineteenth verse) but it also must clearly shift away from it in terms of scene, subject, and tone.

You will have until Tuesday night to make your offers. The Haiku Foundation site has been busy lately and the link to our renku session has not always been obvious on the home page. There is a permanent “Renku Sessions” button a little further down the home page and you can always reach the current session via this route. We will continue to check for new verse offers through each Tuesday.

With best wishes to all,
John

 

New Calendar to Date

new calendar
a year of
“Natural Wonders”

    –John Stevenson

a clownfish offers
the first greeting

    –Peter Newton

taking a fistful
of freshly tilled earth
to my cheek

    –Shrikaanth Krishnamurthy

café aromas
on the warm breeze

    –Maureen Virchau

sound of a flute
slowly rising
with a hazy moon

    –Dru Philippou

flickering light of a bike
from the side road

    –Marina Bellini

under the bed-sheet
tales of bold highwaymen
and horse-drawn coaches

    —Lorin Ford

has the lord executed
his droit du seigneur

    —Polona Oblak

Jimmy Carter
and Rosalynn
on the kiss cam

    —Judt Shrode

after the picnic
some spirited croquet

    —Michael Henry Lee

the old quarry
so deep and cold
and daring

    —Mary Kendall

her scars stay hidden
though the neckline plunges

    –Debbie Feller

each time I wake
the moon lights
something different

    —Gabrielle Higgins

the whir of dragonfly wings
in the remaining heat

    —Sally Biggar

a neutrino
passes through the chestnut
and the worm, too

    —Lorin Ford

the tension of the needle
piercing linen

    —Carmen Sterba

Dutchman’s breeches
sprout along a cliff’s
ragged edge

    —Maureen Virchau

six pairs of boots
by the pilgrim shrine

    –Polona Oblak

in full flight
fledglings skim
through the archway

    –Barbara A. Taylor

This Post Has 52 Comments

  1. Thank you Lorin for your rewrite, and advice re computer issue on this site.

    Paul McNeil’s verse still stands out for me. Do you Paul, accept my slight change?

    my toddler puts her milk glass
    on the kitchen counter

  5. in full flight
    fledglings skim
    through the archway

    –Barbara A. Taylor
    —
    aimed at our rear window
    that telephoto lens
    —
    – Lorin
    – Lorin

  8. Congrats to you, Barbara! A lovely verse. It’s so delicate and uplifting. I’m sorry about your computer problems. Hope all will be resolved soon.
    *
    A wonderful job as sabaki, Polona! I thoroughly enjoyed your perceptive and imaginative commentary. Love the attention to freedom.

  9. Good news, everyone! Barbara will make this verse selection. She can see the offers but is still unable to post. So I will relay her posts for her. Here is the first of those:

    “OK, thanks all. My response thus far, is that I like this verse, with
    amendment:

    my toddler puts her milk glass
    on the kitchen counter

    or, another possible choice:

    praise for a young father’s
    beautiful tattoo

    Athough I worry praise and pilgrim shrine may be too close.
    I want to avoid any opening with definite article. These take us
    somewhere new….”

    1. My computer died on Sunday morning (Mothers’ Day) I’m using a horrible, expensive laptop on which certain keys don’t work (have never worked) & the repairer can’t fix them, including the ‘at’ key. I figured a way round that, at least, via googling, but THF does’t recognise me, i only have access to one email address (achieved after much experimenting and privacy questions)
      —
      Moan, moan … but I’m appreciating those old ‘Big Blue’ ku even more . :-}
      —
      Barbara, I’m surprised and delighted to find my ‘tattoo’ ku mentioned as a possible choice. I see your point about ‘praise’: though it wouldn’t apply to the Japanese shrines that Polona intended, it’s still associated with religion, some forms of Christianity, anyway.
      —
      So I offer a subsitute for ‘praise’ for your consideration, “kudos”. I’ve not come across the word is used in a religious context. It’s from the Greek, and, as a serendipitous back-note, the Greeks built that famous arch in Athens: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arch_of_Hadrian_%28Athens%29

      —
      in full flight
      fledglings skim
      through the archway

      –Barbara A. Taylor
      —

      kudos for a young father’s
      beautiful tattoo
      —
      – Lorin

      1. ps. Barbara: check, when you type in your email address (below your name on this form for a first post (that I’ve had to re-do to be able to post this morning) that there are no spaces in your email address.
        —
        I don’t know, but it might be that simple. A space was what was preventing me from posting, before I spotted it & closed it.
        —
        – Lorin

  20. Babara A. Taylor has asked me to post her thanks to Polona for this selection. She is still having computer problems. As a result of that, she has asked me to make the next selection. I will do so, of course, if necessary but I’ve offered to post her comments, as I’m doing now, if that would encourage her to make it. Will update everyone here when I have her reply.

    I think this idea of having a lot of people participate in the selections is working out very nicely, so far. Thanks!

    1. My computer died on Sunday morning (Mothers’ Day) I’m using a horrible, expensive laptop on which certain keys don’t work (have never worked) & the repairer can’t fix them, including the ‘at’ key. I figured a way round that, at least, via googling, but THF does’t recognise me, i only have access to one email address (achieved after much experimenting and privacy questions)
      —
      Moan, moan … but I’m appreciating those old ‘Big Blue’ ku even more 🙂
      —
      Barbara, I’m surprised and delighted to find my ‘tattoo’ ku mentioned as a possible. I see your point about ‘praise’: though it wouldn’t apply to the Japanese shrines that Polona intended, it’s still associated with religion, some forms of Christianity.
      —
      So I offer a subsitute for ‘praise’ for your consideration, “kudos”. I’ve not come across the word is used in a religious context. It’s from the Greek.
      —
      kudos for a young father’s
      beautiful tattoo
      —
      – Lorin

  24. in full flight
    fledglings skim
    through the archway

    –Barbara A. Taylor
    —
    praise for a young father’s
    beautiful tattoo
    —
    – Lorin

  26. What a lovely verse from Barbara. Congratulations!
    .
    in full flight
    fledglings skim
    through the archway
    –Barbara A. Taylor
    .
    Polona, your explanation was excellent to read. I pictured swallows as well.

  28. lovely

    in full flight
    fledglings skim
    through the archway
    –Barbara A. Taylor

    the doorbell sets off
    a hither and thithering

  37. in full light
    fledglings skim
    through the archway

    ~Barbara A. Taylor

    her half-hearted
    “rah rah sis boom bah!”

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