Sunday, November 21, 2021

Wales Haiku Journal, Autumn 2021

snowy boughs
we shape ourselves
to the season
 

Tsuri-doro: A Small Journal of Haiku and Senryu, Issue #6, November/December 2021

basalt pillars
father used to seem
so tall
 

Stardust Haiku, Issue 58, October 2021

refugee mother
a lost shoe cradles
the rain


Stardust Haiku, Issue 57, September 2021

heatwave
a barrage of hailstones
dents the silence
 

Ribbons, Volume 17, Number 3, Fall 2021

My thanks to Jenny Ward Angyal for her lovely review of The Language of Loss: Haiku & Tanka Conversations. It may be accessed via the book title's tab of this blog.


a whisper
of moths circling
the beacon
it is much too late
for sirens


My thanks to Ryland Shengzhi Li for including my work in his essay, Gifts of Tanka: An Essay on Structure:

"The event-and-response structure comprises an event, state, or thing paired with a response...

the ocean
was in a rage last night
but today,
these peace offerings
of blue mussels and kelp

(1st Place, 2018 Sanford Goldstein International Tanka Contest)

Here, the event comprises the first two lines of the ocean in a rage last night, while the response, today's peace offerings, comes in the last three lines. What follows rage is not destruction, as one might expect, but offerings of peace.

Although the words of the poem focus on the ocean, they also invite the reader to infer meanings about human life. The poem suggests a mood of hopeful expectation in a dire situation, perhaps reconciliation after a fight. If even the ocean, the vastest thing on earth, can resolve rage with peace offerings, how much more so we human beings. In this sense, the poem's description of the ocean gives us perspective and grounding in our own life, while relating the ocean to human affairs helps us see the ocean with greater familiarity. The poem also suggests the impermanence of all things: even a strong emotion like rage will eventually wane and be pacified. The "peace offerings" here are also food items, often used to cultivate peace between humans.

 

Prune Juice, Issue 35, November 2021




 

Haiku Canada Review, Volume 15, Number 2, October 2021

(ir)rational thinking you might even be right


clear conscience
a loon's call drifts
into morning


This issue includes a lovely review by Pearl Pirie of Prairie Interludes. It may be accessed via the book title's tab of this blog.


My thanks to Maxianne Berger for mentioning my work in her review of Window Seats: A Contemporary Anthology of Cat Haiku & Senryu, edited by Stanford M. Forrester:

There are cats who have no homes, and cats who do.

pussy willows
the swollen bellies
of feral cats

(note: this haiku was originally published in Acorn 32, Spring 2014)
 

Daily Haiga: An Edited Journal of Traditional and Contemporary Haiga, November 2021

Featured Artist: November 20, 2021


Note: this haiku was first published in Modern Haiku 51.1, Winter-Spring 2020



Monday, November 08, 2021

Modern Haiku, Vol. 52.3, Autumn 2021

snowmelt
clumps of deer hair
snag the light

Hedgerow Poems, Number 135, 2021

the first bees making sense of dandelions

Mariposa, Number 45, Autumn/Winter 2021

pyrocumulus
the dragon arching
across your back


dusty tack
hangs in empty stalls
redolent
with memories that might
or might not be mine

 

Graceguts: Michael Dylan Welch's Blog, 2021

My thanks to Michael Dylan Welch for including the following collaborative work in his trifold, City Rengay, published in 2021:


Winnipeg Wind

by Michael Dylan Welch (in normal type) and Debbie Strange (in italics)


Portage and Main—
the wind whipping snow
after my missed bus

Assiniboine Forest at dusk
a deer flicks its tail

in the ruin
of St. Boniface Cathedral
a crushed snail

another heatwave—
Leo Mol nudes recline
in the garden

the Golden Boy
still pointing north

at Fort Whyte
the snowshoe tracks
of humans and hares

Note: this rengay first appeared in The Bamboo Hut's Hands Across the Water - A Journal of Collaborative Poetry, December 2018.



GUSTS, Number 34, Fall/Winter 2021

a whirlwind
of forsythia petals . . .
your impatience
with all the little things
that stop me in my tracks


you press
your ear against
a birch's heart
come, listen to the sap
bubbling inside me


a kaleidoscope
of clearwings spinning
above the meadow
on this summer day,
I remember you

Frogpond, Vol. 44, Number 3, Autumn 2021

wolf pack
our social glue
u n s t i c k s


This issue includes Kristen Lindquist's lovely review of The Language of Loss: Haiku & Tanka Conversations:


My thanks to Kristen for taking the time to write such a thoughtful and appreciative review! A transcript of her review may be accessed under this blog's tab for The Language of Loss.


This issue also includes Randy Brooks' wonderful review of A New Resonance 12:



My thanks to Randy for the following excerpt regarding my work:

Debbie Strange is a master at setting a scene, then inviting the reader to settle in for a story. She doesn't provide the end of the story, but just enough to get us anticipating or imagining possibilities. We get the gist and feel the feeling of the tale:

porch swing
songs where we least
expect them


This issue also includes the results of the 2021 Haiku Society of America Merit Book Awards for books published in 2020. My thanks to the judges, Ce Rosenow and Bryan Rickert for awarding The Language of Loss: Haiku & Tanka Conversations an honourable mention in this contest! Their comments follow:

True to its name, Debbie Strange's The Language of Loss explores the many facets of loss and survival using both haiku and tanka. One haiku and one tanka are paired beautifully on every page. Never predictable and always revealing, this book delivers consistent quality from start to finish.

First Frost, #2, Fall 2021

the words
you never meant to say . . .
marginalia
 

Failed Haiku - A Journal of English Senryu, Vol. 6, Issue 71, November 2021

 




Failed Haiku - A Journal of English Senryu, Vol. 6, Issue 70, October 2021



 

Daily Haiga: An Edited Journal of Traditional and Contemporary Haiga, October 2021

Featured Artist: October 19, 2021


Note: this tanka was first published in Kokako 25, September 2016



Creatrix Poetry and Haiku Journal, Number 54, September 2021

hang gliding
the sequential take-off
of fledglings

The Cicada's Cry: A Micro-Zine of Haiku Poetry, Autumn 2021

dead man's fingers
nature puts the fun
in fungus
 

Chalk on the Walk Monoku Project (New Zealand), 2021

Curated by Sherry Grant


Haiga Feature: October 22, 2021


(Note: this monoku received 2nd Place in the 2021 Marlene Mountain Contest)


 

Cattails, October 2021


a wounded crow
pecks at our casement
we open
our shutters and invite
the darkness in


a sheaf
of bamboo strips ready
for weaving
we bend to the task
of shaping each other


the blue lining
of a cormorant's mouth . . .
gap-toothed pier


deserted shack
finger paintings grace
every wall


the vitriol
of (un)social media . . .
spittlebugs

 

Cafe Haiku: The Magazine of the Cafe Haiku Group (Mumbai, Thane, Hyderabad and Chennai), October 2021

Haiga Feature: October 24, 2021





 

Brass Bell, October 2021

Theme: numbers


our deaf Dalmatian more than 101 negative spaces
 

Australian Haiku Society, 2021

Spring 2021 AHS Haiga Kukai: Seasonal Entry


weeping cherry
she never thought
he'd be the first


Spring 2021 AHS Haiga Kukai: Non-seasonal Entry


nothing left
of the rainbow . . .
funnel clouds


(Note: these haiku were written in response to artwork by Ron Moss)

Akitsu Quarterly, Fall 2021

muddy lane
a leaf collage glued
to my boots


sweetgrass
ruffled by the wind . . .
blue-winged teal


sun-warmed sage
the burnished horns
of bison






 

The Mamba, Issue 12 - Africa Haiku Network, September 2021


 

A Fine Line: The Magazine of the New Zealand Poetry Society, Spring 2021

rewilding
we move a box turtle
off the freeway


the last seeds
from father's garden . . .
snowbound