Wooing the Meadowlark

First published in Woodnotes #31, Autumn 1997, pages 52–53. Read the book in PDF form on the Haiku Foundation website.

Wooing the Meadowlark by Mary Fran Meer. Miraclear Press, 1997, 24 pages, paperback, 4 by 6½ inches. Write for price to the author at 1128-108th Avenue SE, Bellevue, Washington 98004 [address no longer correct]. This book is a treat to hold. Its simple printing on unusual paper will delight the reader. A total of 35 haiku are scattered about at one or two, sometimes three per page in this understated first volume of haiku by Mary Fran Meer. Particularly pleasing is the center spread of poems where illustrations of birds cross the page in three small flocks between the poems. As samples, here are the title poem and another favorite:

son’s fluting whistle

woos the meadowlark

ever closer

deep woodland shade

the glow of gold

in the violet’s eye