by Hannah Joy Elliott
My mom writes haiku
My mom publishes haiku
My mom teaches haiku
My mom loves Haiku
I hate haiku
It’s so foreign to me. I don’t even think of it as poetry,
but some art of another age.
Like passages from the bible.
Ideas from a past and place so distant I will never relate.
Artistic expressions of a world I have never seen.
My poetry flows out of me in such a torrent of words.
Emotions like tidal waves that knock everything down.
When I write it’s to bleed onto the page instead of out
of my arm.
What I want to express will never be small enough to fit
in 17 syllables.
I need so many words to share
the wonder of the world, the pain of loss, the joy of love.
What I feel could never be contained in such a
diminutive form.
I rarely write about nature, and I try to be understood in
every line not only the last.
But Poetry has always been a way we can share so
for my mom I’ll try
Gateway to summer
New growth nature’s awakening
This year he’s still gone
Wow
I just took my Biggest emotion and made it haiku.
From Reluctant Mermaids: 2025 Southern California Haiku Study Group Anthology, edited by Kathabela Wilson (Pasadena, California: Southern California Haiku Study Group, 2025, pages x–xi).