Mar 19, 2016 Uncategorized

Photo Credit ©2016 Vijaya Sundaram

Four Haiku
©March 19th, 2016
By Vijaya Sundaram

Sky-shine like blue silk
Road, a glimmering river
My dog and I, fish.

Not a shoal, we two,
Just sun-dazed, slow-moving fish
Silk-threading a cool, blue trail.

Sunlight slips within
Our footsteps rise up like air
We hum-float along.

Plants wave like sea-weeds
The world moves like clear water
Thought-bubbles in Spring.

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Tags: #Figurative poetry, #haiku, #Original Poetry, #Walk with Dog in Springtime

Mar 19, 2016 Daily Life, The Daily Post

In response to The Daily Post’s Daily Prompt:  Dirty

Never Be Free (Of Dirt, That is!)
©March 19th, 2016
By Vijaya Sundaram

Don’t touch that!  It’s dirty!
Don’t go there!  It’s … dirty!
Sit here, not there, it’s … dirty!
Oh no, the dog’s gotten all … dirty!
.
What has happened to me?

I, who raced through the main street in Tirunelveli, chasing after pigs which wallowed in disgusting filth at street corners; I, who played in the mud with great pleasure, making forts and houses and tunnels and parks with my neighborhood friend, when I lived in Pune as a young child; I, who washed my hair rarely when I was a pre-teen, because I had better things to do, so I thought;  I, who rode my bike all over the city, fell down, cut my knees badly, and rode home with city dirt in my wound – I have turned into a fuss-budget!

Alas, now, I’m too careful (although, thank goodness, when I do gardening, I really LOVE the dirt, still)!  And I worry a tiny bit too much, but not so much that I don’t know when I’m fussing.  I let my daughter know that I sometimes fuss overmuch, and that she is free to call me out on it.  And she does.  And we laugh.  Which is good.  (Sorry for the sentence fragments but hey, this is my blog!)

My only real requirements with her are:
Wash your hands before you eat.
Take your bath every day, and be clean
Wash your hair a few times every week.

The nice thing is that she is very obliging, so when she does push back about some silly thing I might worry about (dirt), I know I’ve gone overboard, and I back off.

Holly, our dog, is now used to my wiping her paws when she comes in from the backyard, and washing all four paws if it’s a wet, or muddy day.  I don’t believe in these mat-things.  Dirt goes away only when it’s washed off.  Holly is pretty obliging too – she stands there patiently when I lave her paws in warm water (I think she likes it now), then wipe them off carefully.  Not bad for a dog, actually.

Having Holly, though, has taught me to be much easier about dirt.  I don’t freak out or anything if she’s gross – I simply wash her off, and wipe down the place in a matter-of-fact way.  This is much, much better than my first reaction when she squatted in my study and did her puppy-business within the first few days of our bringing her home.  I squawked in horror, I’m ashamed to say. 

A puppy is not the same as one’s own baby, I’m afraid (although I adore our dog, and thought of her as another child within a few weeks of bringing her to our place).  A young baby does her or his business several times a day, and any squeamishness a parent might have (and strangely, neither my husband nor I had any) will dissipate simply from so much repetition.  Plus, the upside of having a baby is that she or he is not a free-ranging being, not until toddler-hood, which is a whole other thing to worry about.  A puppy, on the other hand, wanders around, and goes here and there, so all this mobility makes one nervous.

Enough with that aspect of this topic!

The interesting thing is that I tolerate clutter (and live in it, even if I’d like to not do so), but I dislike filth.  Earth dirt is not dirty, filth is dirty.  I don’t mind dust,  because that’s just … dust, and I can take care of it easily.

All these are just gradations with all of us.  I suppose true freedom will come when we simply don’t care about such things. 

Alas, then, I don’t think I shall ever be free!

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Tags: #Daily Prompt, #Dirty

Mar 19, 2016 Original Poetry, Senryu, The Daily Post

In response to The Daily Post’s Daily Prompt:  Fight

Fight the Tide Twice
©March 19th, 2016
By Vijaya Sundaram

When the tide comes in
Flooding where you stand and stare –
Fight it, rise and swim!

When the tide goes out,
Dragging, tugging at your feet –
Fight it, dig feet in!
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Tags: #Daily Prompt, #Fight, #Holding steady, #Stubbornness, Fight the tide

Mar 19, 2016 Original Poetry

Swoon-Shine
©March 19th, 2016
By Vijaya Sundaram

The moon hangs down low.
Eyelids half-closed in near-sleep,
I drowse in swoon-shine.*
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The above is my response to the March 17th prompt in  Carpe Diem Haiku Kai.

Swoon-Shine is my play on words for this prompt, with the sense of sleepy swooning I felt, combined with moonshine.

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Today’s haiku writing technique is a challenge by Jane Reichhold who posted in Carpe Diem Haiku Kai.  She writes this:

Dear Haijin, visitors and travelers,

I once started to write, because I like to play with words and bring them to life through my novels and of course through my haiku and tanka. It’s really a joy to dive into the richness of your own language, or in this case here at CDHK, into English, not my maiden language, but it starts to become almost my maiden language.
Today’s haiku writing technique used by Basho has all to do with pleasure to play with words. To explain the meaning of this HWT I will also give the romaji translation of the haiku by Basho for today.

tanabata no awanu kokero ya uchuten

for the Star Festival*
even when hearts cannot meet
rainy-rapture

© Basho (Tr. Jane Reichhold)

Tags: #Carpe Diem Haiku Kai, #haiku, #Moonlight, #Sleepiness, #Swooning