Seven Flowers of Autumn

First published in Modern Haiku 51:3, Autumn 2020, page 117. This sequence also appeared in This Morning's Tides: Commencement Bay Haiku 10-Year Anniversary Anthology (Tacoma, Washington: Commencement Bay Haiku, 2022), page 82. Originally written in September 2015 and April 2017.

       +       +       +       +

七花の節句

Nanahana no sekku


萩 scent of bush clover—

hagi the toddler’s toe prints

drying first


尾花 rising moon—

susuki the sway of silver grass

over the lost softball


撫子 surgery day—

nadeshiko a pot of maiden pink

on the car seat


女郎花 Japanese alps—

ominaeshi patrinia in clumps

of sunshine


葛 overtaking

kuzu on the woodland path

kudzu vines


藤袴 the crushed leaves

fujibakama smell of lavender—

boneset oil


桔梗 with pudgy fingers

kikyo / asagao my daughter twirls

a morning glory


Flowers blossoming in autumn fields

When I count them on my fingers

then they number seven

—Yamanoue-no-Okura, Man’yōshū Imperial Anthology

 


Toshiyori Viewing Bush Clover and the Autumn Moon at the Noji Tama River in Omi Province, with a poem by Toshiyori, from the series “The Six Tama Rivers in the Provinces”