Summer vacation for the mind
“cloud sun cloud,” which sold recently, is 8x10. It was created with painted book pages, washi papers and glue on birch wood. Art © Annette Makino 2021.
An earlier version of the haiku was published in Frogpond 36:1 (Winter 2013); reprinted in A VAST SKY: An Anthology of Contemporary World Haiku, edited by Bruce Ross, Koko Kato, Dietmar Tauchner and Patricia Prime, Tancho Press, 2015; and in Wishbone Moon (Women’s Haiku Anthology), edited by Roberta Beary, Ellen Compton, Kala Ramesh; Jacar Press; 2018.
Well, the news is certainly grim these days. Appalling Supreme Court rulings on abortion and climate change. Multiple mass shootings. The ongoing assault on democracy. The grinding war in Ukraine. The endless Covid pandemic (and please don’t talk to me about monkeypox, I can’t even).
But just for today, I’m going to set all that aside. Instead, I want to share some fun haiku on the general theme of summer travel. Here’s hoping this small dose of humor and lightness will help carry you through these dark days—a mini-vacation for the mind.
the cramped seats
in Economy
mini pretzels
Kingfisher Journal, Issue 2, December 2020
palm frond hut
all night the rooster
announcing dawn
Presence, Issue 68, December 2020
beginning Spanish
I practice staying
in the present
Kingfisher Journal, Issue 1, June 2020
desert flower
I try to pee
generously
Kingfisher Journal, Issue 1, June 2020
Grand Canyon our very small talk
Frogpond, Vol. 43:1, Winter 2020
white hill town
the herder shakes down cherries
for his goats
Presence, Issue 68, December 2020
Following is a rengay, a form of linked verse written together with Cynthia Anderson.
Western Wind
worn atlas
his finger travels
a new route
airing out
the musty suitcase
open road
the dog’s ears
streaming
western wind
the first whiff
of ocean
a row of sand dollars
on the front porch
rocking chair
his head nodding
with the waves
Annette Makino
Cynthia Anderson
Hedgerow, Issue 137, published Dec. 31, 2021
Despite all the madness, here’s wishing you a happy Fourth of July weekend and a fun and relaxing summer!
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Thanks Ukiah! I had a great time reading my poems at the ukiaHaiku Festival in May (shown above), and again as the featured reader for the Writers Read series at the Grace Hudson Museum last week. I appreciate everyone who turned out!
Makino Studios News
Merit Book Award: I am thrilled that Water and Stone: Ten Years of Art and Haiku has received Honorable Mention for Haiga in the Merit Book Awards sponsored by the Haiku Society of America! The commentary by judges Agnes Eva Savich and Bill Cooper was just published in Frogpond: “Perfectly painted pretty colors, poignant haiku, the best kind of storytelling haibun: this decade’s worth of the artist-poet’s work contains all the delights one could dream of from an inspiring haijin of our greater haiku family.” [NOTE: A haijin is someone who writes haiku.]
Art retreat: I will be on a creative retreat the week of July 9-16, writing haiku and making collages. So please get your orders in this coming week!
Solo show: The first-ever show of my collage art will take place at Just My Type in Old Town Eureka, CA in September, with an opening during Arts Alive! on Saturday, September 3. This show is made possible in part by an Artists’ Resilience Grant from The Ink People Center for the Arts.