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Hello All: Today we have a guest giving the prompt for us:

Xenia Tran lives with her husband and two adopted whippets in the Scottish Highlands. The natural beauty of the Highlands and her long-term involvement with animal rescue shelters are a constant inspiration. She runs two photography and poetry blogs, Whippet Wisdom, which features twp adopted whippets Eivor and Pearl, and Tranature – a place created in April of this year for her nature photography and musings. She holds a degree in French Studies, a Master’s Degree in Applied Linguistics and a Postgraduate Certificate in Creative Writing. Her poems and writings have appeared in literary journals, magazines, websites and anthologies. She is currently preparing her first collection of poetry and images for publication

Hello dear fellow poets, my name is Xenia Tran and I am delighted to host Haibun Monday for you tonight.

(photograph by Xenia Tran)

The poetry of Kobayashi Issa (1763-1828) has been translated and interpreted, praised and dismissed by a variety of scholars both in Japan and abroad. David G Lanoue shows Issa’s work through the lens of Pure Land Buddhism, the sect to which Issa belonged. This sect advocates compassion and self-sacrifice for the sake of others, a theme which runs through many of Issa’s haiku.

for our sake
the winter rain …
Buddha

These stone Buddhas endure the cold rain ‘for the sake of the people’. In an interesting twist, Issa feels sympathy for the Sympathiser, compassion for the Compassionate One. The Buddhas appear dejected and forlorn in the icy drizzle, but Issa stops to notice them and by writing his poems, makes the reader notice too.

from the tip
of the field Buddha’s nose …
an icicle

The icicle dangling from the tip of Buddha’s nose raises a chuckle, but the compassion of Buddha for the world and Issa for the Buddha should not be missed, or else one misses the poem’s deeper resonance.

(Haiku and Comment Source: David G Lanoue, ‘Pure Land Haiku: The Art of Priest Issa’)

For tonight’s haibun, please show us or allude in your writing to compassion or self-sacrifice without using these actual words. For those of you who are not familiar with the form, haibun consists of one or two short paragraphs of prose inspired by a real experience, resonant with a sense of place and nature’s moods, followed by a haiku. Keep you prose paragraph brief (150 words maximum) and your language simple. Please include the natural world and reference to a season in your haiku.

If you are new to dVerse, please write and post your haibun on your own blog or web page. Copy the URL of your published post to Mr Linky below and swing by your fellow poets to read and comment. The link will stay open all week, so feel free to take your time.