White dogwood petals–a haiku

White dogwood petals
Fall gently in spring snowfall
Wind shovels for me

Weekly Photo Challenge: Escape

Beauty of mountains
Brings peace to mind and soul
I yearn to be there

http://dailypost.wordpress.com/2013/05/17/photo-challenge-escape/

Spring haiku

Spring often seems to arrive literally overnight…at least the beginning of it. Here are two very different versions of what I saw outside our window last week when spring popped into the northern Illinois area.

While we slept soundly
A spring fairy flitted ‘round
Tapping with green wand

In the dark of night
A green spring bomb exploded
Everywhere outside

Spring blew into town today

Spring blew into town today
Announcing her presence pertly
Windows raised their eyebrows
To let in the balmy air
Cars sprouted in the streets
A backbeat of basketballs and
Children’s shouts provided rhythm
Bags of soil flew from the hardware stores
Lawn mowers coughed and sputtered
Birds tweeted as madly as they could
And Facebook left the laptop and
Took on human form

Friday Fictioneers–Under Cover

Right after family and friends, the short list of things I love most in day-to-day life includes books. The love of books grabbed me as a little girl and I’ve been enmeshed in its web ever since. I unashamedly admit I’m a bibliophile and although I love the ease of my Kindle, I’ll never get rid of my books. Library levies are the only tax increases for which I’ll vote. I love the smell of a new book and browsing in a used bookstore is a joy that never diminishes.

So to honor the love I have for books, my inner muse rolled out a poem in the tradition of the poems of Rudyard Kipling, Dr. Seuss, Ogden Nash, and others (although I’m not comparing my humble offering to any of theirs), poems you might find in the old Childcraft books: the rhyming poem that rolls along, pulls you in, and flows trippingly from the tongue if read aloud (please try it). I hope I’ve achieved a little of that magic this week and perhaps you and your inner child, will enjoy this paean to books.

I’ve even manged to make it come in at exactly 100 words.

Copyright Claire Fuller

….

Under Cover

“Don’t judge a book by its cover”
May or may not be true
But you’ll never discover the story
‘Til you read it through and through.

A book will deliver you places
You can’t ordinarily go
More reliably than the Post Office can
Through the rain and sleet and snow.

It can make you think or make you cry
Turn your world upside down
It holds the power to mesmerize
Without making the slightest sound.

You’ll discover best friends and enemies
The truth and make-believe
And the most wonderful book of all of them
Is one you hate to leave.

…………………………………….

Click here to read all the current stories:

Spring Sunshine

Spring Sunshine

I position my chair in the sunlight streaming through the front window,
the rest of the house behind me
chill in its winter-to-spring transition.

The heat soaks into my grey fleece top
gradually seeping its welcome way through my skin,
into my bones and the center of my body.

Bushes bow slightly before the wind,
waiting to shed their winter bareness for the new growth of spring,
each bare, brown sword-branch tipped with green.

On the porch, a chipmunk overlooks the buttery daffodils and fragile narcissus
ever so slowly raising their rain-battered heads
from soaked obeisance into erect beauty.

Two goldfinches swoop down, perching in the largest bush,
tiny bird-lanterns heralding the start of another Saturday
as a cloud ship moves regally through the sky ocean.

Robins–a haiku

Are robins ever
Babies or do they emerge
Fat and red-breasted?

Fur coat–haiku with photo

Fur-coated bunny
Crouches beneath stacked firewood
Resting watchfully

(Couldn’t get the shot of the rabbit under the woodpile. He or she was a bit too watchful.)

Daffodils–two haiku with photos

Daffodils emerge
Lifting buttery faces
Towards celestial twin

Yellow flower spears
Bravely ignoring weather
Rend the foggy air

The Red Kimono–a haiku

An online friend and writer, Jan Morrill, has published a book called “The Red Kimono”, a story of Japanese in America during WWII.  You can find Jan online at http://theredkimono.com/ or on Facebook and, of course, if you’d like to buy the book, you can find it on Amazon.  

Here’s a haiku I wrote in honor of her book.

Red kimono stands
Starkly against winter snow
I wrap it tightly