from The Zen Space 2016

Work recently published in The Zen Space 2016   Summer Edition


white cyclamen
her nightdress wafts
last light

settling in the wake
of their feet
a pair of swans

morning frost
born on a puff of mist
the robin’s note

secluded pond
a feral cat drinks in
silence

such frailty
wild crocuses    we lean
into prevailing winds

across ice flowers
first thing
the skitter of wrens

cliff top walk
a snail bleached white
fills with rain


Easter Low Tide

Easter low tide
broke back hulls
expose permanence

Anemones
internalise

we take time to muse
a ship’s finality
demised in flint

ribbed reefs
stuck deep

our circled tracks
ephemeral
await each wave’s
elimination

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Patricia Prime's review in KOKAKO 23 September 2015

Dark Seeds Fallen by John Parsons
Labyrinth Press, (2015) Pb. 72 pp, ISBN 978 1 872468 846. For purchases,
please email the author for details of purchase at  jparsons100@googlemail.com

                                                                            reviewed by Patricia Prime

John Parsons is an artist and writer living in Norfolk, UK. Dark Seeds Fallen is his sixth book of haiku. This selection of haiku is illustrated with the author’s black and white drawings.
      The most obvious characteristic of John Parson’s haiku is its sensuous nature, as we see in the title poem, which begins the collection.

                dark seeds fallen
                      honesty becomes
                             more transparent

Nature, beauty, sight and sensation are evoked with a compelling immediacy. This gives the haiku an intoxicating quality. Where it is leading, in the first instance is to more haiku with the same qualities, bringing in other senses and sensations: touch, smell, sound and emotions. Relationships, with other people and loved ones are also present.

                white sun through mist
                      she catches my smile
                               and returns it

From here to the book’s final haiku:

                      sickle moon
                through ranks of sweet corn
                                      slides a fox’s brush

All our senses are cajoled, pampered and stimulated as we follow the poet on a journey through the seasons and countryside of his Norfolk home. Indeed, this last haiku is a measure of how far the poet can take us.
       The core of the book is a series of haiku dealing with nature and the seasons, although ‘dealing with’ is an inadequate phrase with which to describe the way these topics meld with both the wider world and the poet’s masterful command of language.
The following haiku is a good example, bringing words such as ‘horned’, ‘naked’ and ‘quicksilver’ together and, at the same time, moving out from the simple subject to the universal:

                      horned moon
               the naked pollard shivers
                                a pool of quicksilver

Similarly, in an otherwise very different haiku:

                    snorting saliva
               the great red bull eyes me
                           with indifference

Words like ‘snorting’, ‘great red bull’ and ‘indifference’, present us with the scary truth of the angry beast.

The following haiku:

                   old war defences
                a snake skin sloughed
                        across barbed wire

presents us with thoughts of life and death (all too familiar from war footage on TV). Here it is only a snake’s skin caught on barbed wire, but an image which the haiku might bring to mind is that of a battlefield.
          The collection ranges widely, from birds, butterflies and flowers to the poet’s personal life and emotions, as in the following haiku with its intimate scene:

                   I zip her up
                        brush her down
                             she offers a cheek

No matter the setting: garden, bus queue, beach, river, workshop or sea, Parsons’ descriptive touch is sure, his landscapes are even better when peopled by characters he delineates with warmth, humour and empathy. The old ladies, the old salt, a lone walker, his mother, a wedding party are minimally but powerfully sketched as we see in the following haiku:

                         outside the pub
                      small boy talks to himself
                                         on walkie talkies

This is a collection to savour, not just for its delights but for its insights into the richness that lies beneath the surface of our lives. It is one of the most significant things about haiku that it focuses on the ‘moment’; the greatest haiku achieve this seamlessly and simultaneously. Haiku that do so effectively are rare enough, and to read one of ‘Parsons’ collections that achieves this so effortlessly is a privilege,

.....

DARK SEEDS FALLEN

The new book of haiku will be reviewed
in the next issue of KOKAKO

dark seeds fallen
   honesty becomes
          more apparent

    dead of night
a finger of moonlight
                 feels her pulse

things best unsaid
  I pick up stones
     with holes in them


........

TOUCHSTONE AWARD 2013

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Latest haiku achievement, winner of this year's 
'MERIT AWARD' in the 25th ITO EN OI Ocha 
New Haiku Contest, with..............


flea market
so much of my childhood
now collectible

*

RECENT AWARDS.................

TOUCHSTONE AWARD  for

silence of snow
we listen to the house
grow smaller

This haiku also gained best of issue in FROGPOND 2013 and Museum of Literature Award.

**

SECOND PRIZE,  'AN (COTTAGE) PRIZE'  in the annual  GENJUAN HAIBUN COMPETITION
for   'UNCLE WALTER'

                                                        Uncle Walter

Just after the war, I am sent to Aunt Cath’s in Burnham Thorpe, Nelson’s birthplace. It nestles between the Holkham estate and the great empty expanse of salt marsh that lines the coast; a world of mystery and magic. Steam engines rumble across fields, ‘night soil’ men visit in the dark. The only light is oil, ghost stories of black dogs and headless horsemen abound.

“Uncle Walter’s a dirty old chap” says my aunt Cath, “he washes his face in that old water butt where we drowned the kittens”.

                                                by the flint cottage

                                                     into green depths

                                                                spiral nymphs

North Norfolk could only be reached by a single track train; its inaccessibility protected the folk lore and traditions. Uncle Walter, with his rich musical accent, is the epitome of all this, from his battered trilby to his gaiters. On his back door are a mandolin and a twisted hazel. His table is littered with hedging tools and gin traps, even an old bird’s nest. On the wall, foxed prints include the Death of Nelson. A stuffed cat sits on the mantel, a squirrel gun leans in the corner; all magic to my eyes.

                                                 from his pocket 

                                                        a coiled ferret

                                                                    unsprung 

Uncle has a black pony called Bess that pulls a trap. I help him collect hay from the verges, using a sickle. On our return I perch on top, soak up its smell; listen to the rhythm of hooves, to him talking with Bess in that sing song voice. He has a special way with her; she seems to read his mind. I ask him if it’s true.

                                                  

                                                down Old Lowses

                                                      at a pace through wreaths

                                                                of roll-up smoke

                                                        

He tells me of Suffolk horse men during World War One, how he’d learnt their secrets. He touches his nose and gives a wink. “Them old boys knew a trick or two, they had a secret power; they could calm a horse, even when the big guns went off. “They called it jading; a stoat’s liver mixed with oils, rubbed on the horse’s shoulder blade, with a piece of mare’s caul, but best was one touch from the toad’s bone”.

“A toad’s bone?” I repeat.

“Yes boy, a sort of wishbone. You catch a toad and hangs it in a thorn till its all dried up, then you buries it in the ant’s fortress. On the full moon you throws it in the beck. If the hip bone swims upstream, you catch it and keeps it under your arm. Its this bone my boy, that gives you the power.

We arrive home and unload the hay, Bess, out of her harness, stands in the yard; he smiles and murmurs something to her. She nods and walks quietly into the stable.

                                                 whispers from childhood

                                                        still close

                                                              in the darkness

JUST RELEASED, an extremely small completely hand made edition of 142 Tanka. Numbering 40 copies in all, as a thank you gift to all friends and close supporters over the years.