Haiku Chain

This week I jumped into a Haiku series which involved sporadic exchanges between multiple poets. The concept is based off of the traditional poetry games from Japan— poetry circles gathering to write numerous verses on a similar theme or subject.


Melissa Allen (@myyozh) began the chain with a verse she posted on her Haiku blog Red Dragonfly:

          fireflies
          less light than I want
          more than I need
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N. J. Barico ( @NJBarico) responded with:

          abandoned love letter
          I read it under the light
          of fireflies
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Kris Lindbeck (@KrisLindbeck) responded on her eponymous blog:
          your face
          flickering in and out
          firefly light
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At which stage I jumped in with:

          Haloed by milkweed—
          Buddha sits tonight, waiting
          for the first firefly.
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The random variety of poems, as a whole, in the end operates like a field filling up with random lights of fireflies, small lanterns— each individual voice shows a distinct theme echoing from among the others. A collection of ideas.