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Cherry Blossom season is a cultural icon in Japan. The vibrant beauty of one of the earliest bloomers, Cherry trees boldly announce Spring with a plethora of beauty that intoxicates vernal aspirants. Good afternoon, poets. Frank Tassone here, your host for Haibun Monday, where we blend haiku and prose poetry to create the form Basho made famous. Today, let’s embrace this Spring: let’s talk about first [cherry] blossoms (hatsu hana)!

This year’s unusual weather has led to some exceptional Cherry blossom developments. Washington DC’s Cherry Blossom Watch reports that the Cherry trees of the capital’s tidal basin reached peak bloom on March 17th! The forecast in Japan, however, indicates that the peak bloom is expected next weekend. Here in my Long Island Sound corner of New York’s Backyard, some Cherry trees have begun to bud; perhaps the first bloom may arrive by Easter (next week).

I certainly can’t wait, and I’m not alone. During the Heian court era in ancient Japan, the Cherry Blossom season was an annual inauguration of Spring. Some of the finest Waka (today’s tanka) commemorated the iconic blossom. Today, bloom watchers flock to locales noted for Cherry tree groves; blossom festivals in such places have become common.

Cherry Blossoms continue to inspire haijin:

Cherry Blossoms

Spring has come. The cherry trees are puffed out in pink pride, their blossoms trembling in the breeze over the laughter of the happy family below, enjoying hanami, the older ones with their saké and the younger ones squealing for sweets. 

Even as the blossoms swell to fullness, the trees lose their grip on the petals, which, one by one and then in clouds, pirouette to the ground, where they lie in scented carpets. Beneath one of these trees, a child with a toy truck scoops a bed of blossoms as he sings a tune about wheels going round and round.

He switches off the video. One of those happy drinkers has passed away. It was so many springs ago he lost that yellow truck. Now he knows why the older ones laughed when they drank, and why, perhaps, they drank.

The pink blossoms are back, and it is hanami once again. It won’t be long—before the aging trees lose their grip.

my late mother’s birthday
cherry blossoms
choke the stream

Robert Witmer
Tokyo, Japan Drifting Sands

January 29, 2022

Michael Dylan Welch

Jabbering

Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.

        making it new
                   another poem
         about cherry blossoms

CHO 16:1 (April 2020)

Today, let’s celebrate the arrival of spring ourselves. Write a haibun that alludes to the first [cherry] blossoms (hatsu hana).

New to haibun? The form consists of one to a few paragraphs of prose—usually written in the present tense—that evoke an experience and are often non-fictional/autobiographical. They may be preceded or followed by one or more haiku—nature-based, using a seasonal image—that complement without directly repeating what the prose stated.

New to dVerse? Here is what you do:

  • Write a haibun that alludes to the first [cherry] blossoms (hatsu hana).
  • Post it on your personal site/blog.
  • Include a link back to dVerse in your post.
  • Copy your link onto the Mr. Linky.
  • Remember to click the small checkbox about data protection.
  • Read and comment on some of your fellow poets’ work.
  • Like and leave a comment below if you choose to do so.
  • Have fun!