trolley spider-bus
crawls into the sunset
leaving cobweb tracks
Copyright 2013 Brenda Davis Harsham
Tag Archives: friendly fairy tale
Pear Tree HaĪbun
I have planted hundreds of vegetables, herbs, flowers, bulbs and shrubs in my years of gardening, but very few trees. Last year, I planted one tree for each of my three children in our yard where we could watch them grow. We tended them carefully, watering them during the long, hot months. This spring, our young pear tree was covered in white blooms, like a bride on her wedding day. All those white blooms dropped away in days, covering the ground like a veil, before they blew away on the wind, and became part of the earth again.
white blossoms drifting
petals falling to the earth
nourishing our soil
The heart-shaped leaves budded and turned emerald green soon after. Our tree produced oxygen and shade all summer long, and it grew a few inches in height and width every month of the summer. Today, I could see that several hard frosts had taken their toll. The leaves had turned a rainbow of colors: yellow, orange, red, purple with darker spots of indigo. A closer view revealed small brown fruit only as big as my fingernail. Even the squirrels have not harvested these vestigial pear, although the squirrels were pleased to eat our jack o’lanterns.
Halloween is past
squirrels have nibbled their repast
pumpkins are tasty
We would rather eat pumpkin than those tiny, rudimentary pear treats, too. Only a faery could love those tiny vestigial pears. I hope the fae harvest them, and serve them at a harvest dance, perhaps taking the leaves to make splendid gowns. I like to imagine them squeezing the pear juice into an acorn cup and drinking the nectar under the twinkling stars while the pipers play a reel.
faeries dance and smile
starlight washing cares away
sipping pear nectar
Copyright 2013 Brenda Davis Harsham
Prepared for the weekly ligo haibun challenge, the prompt this week being faery, which I could not resist! 🙂
Fairy Candles In The Sky!
Elephant’s Picture Book is saving many gorgeous illustrations, and making them available to us on-line! This one is a friendly fairy tale, but to find many others, visit her site. I hope you enjoy it. Have a great weekend! Brenda
The Candle-Lighters
When shadows creep at eventide
And little ones are safe inside,
Bright stars a-twinkling way up high
Are Fairies’ candles in the sky.
When shadows creep at eventide
The Fairies take their evening ride;
On flitting fireflies wafted high
They light their candles in the sky.
A Year With the Fairies.
Written by Anna M. Scott.
Illustrations by M. T. (Penny) Ross.
P. F. Volland & Co.: Chicago, U.S.A. 1914.
Care to Dance?
Released from my anchor, skittering adrift,
Where the wind takes me, I stop and listen.
A kneeling player, skilled fingers quicken on the drum.
Mallets hit a marimba in six eight time.
Two instrument emit an intertwining wave creation.
I cannot keep still with so much magical precise pounding,
Finding echoes in my inner dreamscape, awakening.
Impulse to dance hits me, no defense needed.
Arms outstretched, fists clenched,
Toes pointed, tap, tapping in rhythm.
Mind’s a whirl, I’m breathing, spinning.
Dancing jig time, whole mind, to music faster.
Invisible whisperings from resonating strings within
My body is limber and loose, infinite sinews singing.
No distance now between me and the music.
Whisperings, soundings, plumbing depths of movement.
No longer carried by the wind, instead every part moving to sing.
Movement become music and music movement.
This was my first Sunday Whirl, done rather late, but better late than never! 😉
Copyright 2013 Brenda Davis Harsham
Smokebush in the Fall
Raspberry leaves dance on a chilly breeze.
Kissed by cold stardust, the violet-edged leaves
Outshine the fading summer’s flowers.
Luminous leafy ovals welcome the coming sleep.
Life force gathers into the stems, retreating root deep
And no cold winter can extinguish its secret powers.
Copyright 2013 Brenda Davis Harsham
Starry Tree Haiku
Starry, starry night
Flaming flowers that brightly blaze
Swirling clouds in violet haze
— Don McLean, from Starry, Starry Night
(describing Van Gogh’s painting)
November night,
Incandescent, magic sight,
Transcendent with light.
Copyright 2013 Brenda Davis Harsham
Namibia HaĪbun
Himba Tribal Woman, Namibia, Africa
Photo by Dr Agnieszka Wojtecka, Gdansk, Poland
I was born in Namibia in the heat of the summer sun, outside a homestead beside the Kunene River, many miles from the Skeleton Coast. Mukuru blessed my beloved Namibia with music, dancing and poetry.
homestead in grasslands
waters flow like gold blessings
river meeting sand
My young mother glistened with the traditional red ochre called otjize, which she made from the Omuzumba shrub in the way her mothers and sisters have done since a time beyond memory. Grandfather, the headman, tended the okuruwo, the sacred fire, feeding it Mopane branches. He had not let the fire die for sixty years. Over the fire, he spoke to his ancestors. Nearby, his daughter sat quietly, her braids shading her face, listening to music ripple like heat waves. His music drew my spirit down, and I sang my song to her, her braids sliding along her neck as she lifted her face to the sky.
red braids, shining face
your magic called me to earth
my song filled your ears
Sitting in stillness beside the Mopane in the meagre shade, she first heard my song. Her face shone with the light of the powerful desert sun. She listened carefully, and with her natural musical talent she quickly learned my song. I returned to my long dreaming, but she continued to sing my song. She called my spirit from the dreaming land back to the earth. The women welcomed me on the day of my birth, singing my song through the long hours of her labor.
first gasp of hot air
I cried from surprise, alone
watery world gone
You nourished my spirit, Mother of my earthly body. When I was sad, my mother sang my song, and my spirit remembered the dream land. I joined my song to the songs of the villagers and those of my sisters and brothers. I learned to tend the cattle among the men, but I thought often of my mother. When a lion came for the cattle, it scared me. I held my fear tight until my mother and the villagers sang my song, and my spirit soared high again. In dry years, the cattle grew thin in the high reaches, but the river sustained us like my mother sustained me. Always the cattle could find grass by the Kunene.
water is precious
waters draw grassland from sand
liquid sky, god’s gift
Copyright 2013 Brenda Davis Harsham
Written for the weekly Ligo Haibun challenge (making Fridays more beautiful for us all).
Articles used in writing the story:
http://theperfectbirth.wordpress.com/2013/04/22/the-himba-namibia-the-birth-song/
http://birthpsychology.com/free-article/very-early-parenting-african-model-childs-song
http://www.newafricanfrontiers.com/namibia/country-info/people-of-namibia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Himba_people
http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0401/feature2/index.html?fs=www7.nationalgeographic.com
Sky Giant Haiku
Sky giant smiling;
His backstroke breaks cloud cover,
Watches autumn shine.
Copyright 2013 Brenda Davis Harsham
November Haiku
Iceskating Fairies
Thistles with icy prickles
Nature rimmed in white
Copyright 2013 Brenda Davis Harsham
Hello Kitty Halloween Haiku
silent, flickering
the spirit of halloween
glowing in the dark
Copyright 2013 Brenda Davis Harsham
Two Trees Haiku
Years long past we two,
Racing to grow fast, taller,
Siblings of the heart.
Copyright 2013 Brenda Davis Harsham
Spellbook Haībun
“And then there are the times when the wolves are silent and the moon is howling.”
— George Carlin
Autumn leaves tapped the small windows. Elspeth blew the dust off the book. She knelt amidst generations of clutter and debris in the Martin family attic. She was looking for a costume, because Halloween was that night. On the leather book cover was burnt a full moon surrounded by a five-sided symbol. As the dust settled on old crocheted blankets and old-fashioned high chairs, she opened the book at random.
hidden in the trunk
voice rusty with disuse
still with much to say
“Scarab powder, dash of scaly rot, and ground bat bones sprinkled on seven squashed wolf spiders. Stir widdershins under a howling moon with a finger of oak. Stroke quarter over the main mast and quarter on the crow’s nest. Every particle that remains, seal in wax and burn until gone in the hold. Soon will come to you a strong headwind, fair weather and enemy bane. Beware shoal and reef, but raise proudly your flag, for safe port you will make, wise cargo making your fortune.”
seek the howling moon
sailing toward future fortune
magic within you
Fate had brought her to her ancestor’s spellbook, and fate denied becomes foe. Elspeth decided to be a witch for Halloween. She had no immediate need for a sailing spell, but perhaps it could be adapted for her car. Elspeth embraced the book, and put it back under the crocheted afghans in Grandma Demeter’s favored avocado and pumpkin colors. Grandma Demeter had always seemed to have a charmed life. Now Elspeth knew why.
hold close heritage
its magic will come to you
when fate brings you home
Copyright 2013 Brenda Davis Harsham
Prepared from the weekly Līgo Haībun challenge. Please visit them if you want to see some great writing!
