Jenny Zhang on Sour Heart

[@BUKCOLLECTOR]

Enjoyed your poems and unique word choices that engaged me throughout. I’m a poet specializing in Japanese forms: haiku, tanka, haibun, kyoka, senryu. I hope you don’t mind me sharing a tanka and my haiku, a tribute poem to Bashō’s frog with commentary by the late AHA founder and poet Jane Reichhold who considered my Basho haiku among her top 10 haiku of all time. What an honor. Here’s the Bashō poem and commentary: Bashō’s frog four hundred years of ripples At first the idea of picking only 10 of my favorite haiku seemed a rather daunting task. How could I review all the haiku I have read in my life and decide that there were only 10 that were outstanding? Then realized I was already getting a steady stream of excellent haiku day by day through the AHA forum. The puns and write-offs based on Basho's most famous haiku are so numerous I would have said that nothing new could be said with this method, but here Al Fogel proved me wrong. Perhaps part of my delight in this haiku lies in the fact that I agree with him. Here he is saying one thing about realism-ripples are on a pond after a frog jumps in, but because it refers back to Basho and his famous haiku, he is also saying something about the haiku and authors who have followed him. We, and our work, are just ripples while Basho holds the honor of inventing the idea of the sound of a frog leaping is the sound of water As haiku spreads around the world, making ripples in more and larger ponds, its ripples are wider-including us all. But his last word reminds us that we are ripples and our lives ephemeral. It will be the frogs that will remain. ~~ And my tanka: returning home from a Jackson Pollock exhibition I smear my face with paint and turn into art ~~ -All love in isolation from Miami Beach, Florida. Al

[@BUKCOLLECTOR]

Brief Bio: I’m Al Fogel born in 1945 and at an early age began writing poems. In 1962 I was introduced to a neighbor who just returned from Avatar Meher Baba’s “ East west” gathering and handed me a book titled “The Everything and the Nothing” that included brief but powerful passages by Meher Baba that touched me deeply and i became a “ Baba Lover” I continued writing poems and in 2010 while on Jane Reichhold’s AHA website workshopping poems I befriended a Chinese man who helped me perfect my Senryu and Haibun. Subsequently I am now considered one of the nations leading authorities on Tanka , Senryu, and Haibun. Here are some examples of each of my specialties senryu ~ dentist chair the hygienist removes my Bluetooth ~ Internet argument all his words in CAPS hers in EMOTICONS ~ after the divorce he spends more time at the dollar store ~ damsel in distress clarke kent still searching for a phone booth ~ cauliflower ears once a contender now boxing vegetables ~ under the influence - moonshine ~ Audubon sale all variety of seeds. . . early birds welcome ~ Buddhist fortune cookie the unfolded paper reads “ better luck next birth!” ~ sudden downpour. . . the adults run for shelter ~ sidewalk cafe the birds and people tweeting ~ busy crosswalk the seeing eye dog leads the way ~ **senryu is usually humorous, but it can also be serious. For example, the following two of mine are horrific and heartbreaking ( dealing with the Holocaust): ~ cattle cars between the slats human eyes ~ stutthof - the stench of burnt hair from the chimneys ~ Tanka ( I already posted the Jackson Pollock one about painting his face but here’s another Tanka ~ Here is another Tanka: thrift store purchase inside the leather jacket a tarnished half-heart ~ Haibuns The Mathematics of Retribution “Karma is i fathomable,” I inform her It’s late and our conversation turns heavy “ Seems simple to me, “my girlfriend responds. “If I murder you, then it’s reasonable that I will be murdered in this or another life to balance the ledger.” “ Not necessarily so” I’m quick to rejoin. “What if you murdered me in this life because I murdered you in a prior life karmic debts and dues are now equalized.” “But what if I get caught and I go to jail for life. Where’s the equal payback in that?” “As I said, karma is unfathomable.” We continue discussing reincarnation and then add the possibilities of “group karma” to the mix Finally, at about midnight, we fall asleep Stutthof - the stench of burnt hair from the chimneys ~~ Mama There were days when I pretended to be too sick to go to school - - just for mamas loving embrace -her arms the heat of home Even with the onset of dementia, her cheerfulness was so contagious it was a joy being around her despite the illness. She made everyone laugh with her spontaneous unpredictable behavior. nursing home bumper wheelchair her favorite pastime Once a week I would whisk her away from the assisted-living facility and we would spend several hours together -grabbing a meal or frequenting some of her favorite second-hand stores where she loved to shop and donate clothes. When we drove to her favorite thrift in November, her dementia worsened. thrift store the dress mama donated she wants to buy On a cold December morn mama passed. The funeral was simple. There was a light drizzle as the family gathered at the gravesite. One by one, with eyes full of rain, we said our last goodbyes. autumn twilight - oh mama tuck me under hug me one more time ~ ‘Round Midnight It was a huge ballroom on the top floor of a building on Broadway --an important midtown crossroads in the heart of the Great White Way. My uncle still talks with reverence about how -in his heyday -he would travel by rail to the corner of Lenox and walk inside to the beat of jungle music. Who knew what to expect? One night you might be listening with rapt attention to Theloneous Monk and Dizzy Gillespie the godfathers of bebop in their signature beret caps, or the Nicholas Brothers flashing their wild acrobatic spins and splits, or enchanted by the sweet taste of Brown Sugar -with Bojangles out front. And when the Bird was in flight, even the moon was not high enough. But in 1940 the ballroom closed its doors to make way for a commercial housing development and another kind of night. new Harlem the a-train replaced by the bullet ~ Atlantic City New Jersey I had just graduated from high school I remember stopping for saltwater taffy -as evening journeyed slowly into night. Nearing curfew, we sat on a protruded sandy enclave--holding hands, looking out at the ocean, not saying much. In the distance the lights from an ocean liner flickered as the night kept coming on in... first “french kiss” under the boardwalk “over the moon!” ~~ All love, Al

[@michaelhowells7790]

Brill.....