Animus
A six-person river raft bobbing up and down in the frigid Animus River. A paddle stretched out too far. One rapid, knocking me overboard.
beyond white foam so many spruces
Break the surface. Still holding the safety line circling the raft. My face, slapped by the river. Again. Again. Back under. Bubbles from my last breath. Jagged rocks scrape my back. One clear thought: I could die here.
river’s roar any moment the call to let go
Hands press my shoulders down. I ricochet above the rapids. Those same hands — my friend and raft partner — pull me aboard.
more paddling last rapids left behind
first published in Image Curve, April 16, 2015
Photograph by Andrew Spencer
Bjorn hosts Haibun Monday over at dVerse Poets Pub. He asks for a haibun featuring water.
UPDATED (5/31/18): Sanaa, over at Real Toads, imagines Water Under The Bridge ~
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Categories: haikai, haiku community
Frank J. Tassone 
Gasping! You write for the 6th sense, the kinesthetic, with sublime perfection. The reader moves and breathes with you.
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Thanks, Jilly! Hope you’ve caught your breath by now! 🙂
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Wheeze! Mostly… Is that river somehow related to an angry stretch of the Black River? The photo gives that appearance.
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The Animus river runs in Colorado, southwest to Durango. I honestly don’t know what river is I. The photo. 😆
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And I was thinking you had come up for air long enough to click the photo… 🙂
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😆
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I love the form. And, of course, the ride!
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Thanks, Charley!
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Good description of that experience. It reminds me why I won’t be doing any of that rafting. I like how you broke the haiku between three sets of texts as if you were trying to fight the rapids.
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Thanks, Frank!
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I love how you bring the small one-line haiku as breaks in that action filled adventure… friends are great to have.
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Thanks! I chose that friend to be in my wedding party three years after the ride.
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I love the form of this breath-taking white water ride!
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Thanks!
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What an adventure and glad you are here to tell the tale! The one-line haiku are very effective here and flow with the prose ☺
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What a great feeling of immediacy and danger for the reader! I also like how you structured this, it worked well.
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Thanks!
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love the picture of your spill on the trip — so many of us have had the same. I was waiting for the Haiku at the end — did it get swallowed by the rapids?
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😆 thanks, Sabio! All Haiku accounted for, if soaking wet. I used the one-line form called monoku throughout the haibun.
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Excellent tale, Frank! I love the form you used to weave in and out of the action.
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Thanks!
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Never heard of monoku before, in all my years of writing Japanese forms. It would have been nice if it had been complied into a haiku at the end of the most excellent prose.
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Jim Kacian coined the term for one-line haiku. I believe you can find his essay on it in the archives if the Haiku Foundation. If not, he originally published it in either Frogpond or Modern Haiku.
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Actually, to be honest, I don’t care for fauxku….Thanks though.
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My goodness this is absolutely breathtaking! 💜💜
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I felt that moment of “I might die here” as the water swept you under. So well written. Last weekend, a 52 year old woman died here surfing, just that quickly. She was here to attend her daughter’s wedding, and died saving her younger daughter – they didnt realize that the tide had made that spot deadly. So tragic. The water has such power.
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Thanks, Sherry. My heart goes out to the family of that unfortunate woman!
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Now that was scary imagining yourself in the same predicament and out of control. Excellent read!
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Thanks! It was scary when it happened! 😉
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Yes, I remember, overboard, going down in green water, bubbles going up, I was pulled in to world that was new, cold and wet. Loved your write.
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I have yet to canoe gently over our little mountain creeks – I can’t imagine the fear you describe here… (makes for great photography though!)
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Indeed! Thanks for reading! 😀
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