Hi, Friends!
I usually send a paid post with some free haiku comics on Tuesdays. But the past several days we’ve been dealing with a lot, including some mysterious health issues with our 14-year-old son, G.
Tonight, G was taken by ambulance to the hospital where my wife works. We still don’t know what’s wrong, and we’re waiting for the results of more tests and imaging.
You never want something like this for one of your children, and while I know that most likely everything will work out, it’s hard not to ponder all the negative possibilities.
Still, it’s my nature to hope and work for the best.
I’ll post a members’ post later this week.
For now, please enjoy these poetry comics and send a positive thought, prayer, or wave of energy my son’s way.
Instead of a post with new poems, essays, and comics, I’m sharing some of the comics that I’m proudest of from the past little bit.
I hope these comics will bring you, and me, a measure of peace.
Haiku Comics
This poem has a special place in my heart and you will be hearing more about a project related to it in the coming weeks.
I wander between conifers and the cosmos discovering clues
I love the word zephyr so much!
serenaded by a chorus of costal grass led by a zephyr
This is still one of my favorite bird sightings.
cool summer morning a lone green heron examines the shimmering pond
I originally published this one as a full-page comic like the green heron comic above, but I think it works better in this newspaper-strip style format.
a late night rescue through the coastal range switchbacks veiled in fog and rain
It’s hard to go wrong with a Willamette Valley dawn.
ethereal glow puts Cascades in silhouette autumnal sunrise
I will be making more abstract haiku comics in the weeks ahead. I love the process and how it stretches my mind.
lonely, wet ashpalt gleams with tri-color splendor from traffic lights
I will also be making a lot more surreal haiku comics because these are the things I see in my head most of the time.
a business heron waits in a moonlit garden for a deal to close
The human need to control the uncontrollable is what gets us into the most trouble.
nature reminds us with a single winter storm we are powerless
I love the way the colors in this one turned out, and I love that this poem reminds me of my kids and my mom.
the moon on their wings, wild geese honking as they soar— the sounds of music
This is the first mammal I ever illustrated well enough to share it with the world. I also feel like this haiku came to me to deliver a piece of wisdom I needed at that time.
meal for a squirrel a perfect tiny acorn, seed of a forest
Other Kinds of Poetry Comics
I do write a lot of poetry that isn’t haiku but I have not illustrated as many of these poems. Here are a few that I like.
A free-verse poem.
Owl Prayers
The owls returned last night,
their hoots echo
through our hallowed hollow
like baleful prayers beseeching the divine
for intercession.
A tanka—that’s a haiku plus two more seven-syllable lines.
a devious god, forbidden to create life, hid the precursors in the stars of the cosmos supernovas birthed us all
Okay, so technically this is a poem with three stanzas, each one a haiku. What can I say, I’m obsessed!
Eternity in Three Acts
a twilight respite,
fierce sun sets, and god's palette
spills across the sky
lonely firmament,
the half-moon waits for the stars
to come out and play
heaven's chorus bursts
as billions of dying worlds
sing Earth's elegy
Be the poetry you want to see in the world!
Cheers,
Jason
I hope you'll soon have the right diagnosis for your son, Jason. And may he recover fully and quickly!
You should be proud!