Haiku Classic 2

by Dhugal J. Lindsay

Commentary first published 6 December 2020 on the Mainichi website (Japan). See also “Haiku Classic 1,” “Haiku Classic 3,” and “Haiku Classic 4.”

end of the year—

the swing’s muddy underside

reflected in a puddle

Michael Dylan Welch (1962– )

From Sitting in the Sun, Haiku North America conference anthology, Sammamish, Washington, 2019

At the end of the year, we reflect back on the year that was and look to the future, wondering what the New Year will bring. The upper side of the swing seat is clean, worn and polished by the bottoms of all the children who have swung on it. But in the puddle that has formed in the depression worn in the ground by those children’s feet we can see a reflection of its underside - covered in mud! I think of Janus and the two-sided nature of so many things. The yin and the yang are both needed for a functioning whole.