The drought continues. What roared through verdant channels now trickles. The lion’s roar is a kitten’s purr. Empty space calls forth a steady blankness.
Haiku flow easily enough. Tanka pour out with little difficulty.
But haibun?
I am William Shakespeare from “Shakespeare in Love,” lying on his apothecary’s couch, saying, “I’ve lost my gift.” The muse hisses at my pleas, muttering about what happened to my belief in practice. She’s right. I’ve scarecly lifted the gel-ink, push-button writer’s pen I bought at stables to write haibun in my refillable journals. The promises of “haibun hour” I’ve made, I break.
Thus, now that I go to the well, I find only dust emerging from a rickety bucket.
twilight
even in the cold
cricket songs
UPDATE: I’m hosting Haibun Monday (9/27/21) today over at dVerse, where we write about writer’s block!
The Pub is open! Come join us!
Share the love. Spread the haikai:
Categories: haikai, haiku community
Hi Frank, this is great! I really like the Shakespeare reference.
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Thanks, Mark! 😀
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au contraire, mon ami. Sensationale!
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Thanks, Ron!
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I’m with Ron on this one!
BTW – what’s “haibun hour”?
❤
David
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You speak with eloquence of “losing your gift”. The old bard left us with no many great words and phrases. What a gift he had! No doubt your muse will arise once again, filled with wit and wisdom!
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Thank you, Beverly!
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I love your post Frank. Words coming from the dry well in a bucket of rust! I think you do very well with Haibun!
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Thanks, Dwight! I definitely need to dredge the well! 🤣
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Love the Shakespeare reference. You don’t seem to be not kidding about the WB. But “this too shall pass”, right?
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That’s the hope! Thanks, Glenn! 😀
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“You don’t seem to be not”…I used to could write better than that.
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I hear you! 😂
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This grabs me:
“I go to the well, I find only dust”
What a great line, Frank.
September rain falls
cleaning all of the dust away
bucket bobs in well
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Thanks, Lisa!
Sweet haiku! 😀
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You’re welcome and glad you like the haiku your words inspired.
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Hope the rains come and the groundwater rises in your well, Frank! Thanks for the all-too-real prompt 🙂
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Thanks, Lynn!
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Nice one Frank. Actually luv the shift from tect to haiku. Nice surprise there.
Happy you dropped by my blog
Much💖love
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This is beautifully written with marvellous imagery, Frank. Perhaps the cricket song has awakened your muse!
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Great post, I love your images – perhaps the drought is beginning to clear.
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Excellent haibun, and fine writing.
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“I find only dust emerging from a rickety bucket” — Perfect!
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Frank,
The emptiness of blank page, the drought of inspiration: your haibun says it all. You’ve definitely tapped into the imagery of writer’s block frustration.
pax,
dora
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Such a wonderfully poetic lament. Even though you feel you are blocked you write eloquently of the experience.
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If this is how one writes with a writer’s block, I would any day welcome one, Frank. You are truly inspiring.
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Lamenting one’s inadequacies out loud.
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I love this… and I do remember the challenge to write anything too long when I tried to write short stories at around 5000 words when coming from flash fiction…
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That is the great fear…have I lost the ability……great writing…thanks..
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