As we approach the dog days of summer (or the doldrums of winter), we have an international sensation to experience! Frank Tassone, here, your host for today’s Haibun Monday, where we blend prose and haiku to form that beloved Japanese hybrid. Today, let’s talk about the 2024 Summer Olympics!

Nicknamed the Goodwill Games, the Olympics, ancient and modern, featured sports competitions held to showcase talent, accomplishment, and bragging rights:

The modern Olympic Games or Olympics (French: Jeux olympiques)^[a][1] are the leading international sporting events featuring summer and winter sports competitions in which thousands of athletes from around the world participate in a variety of competitions. The Olympic Games are considered the world’s foremost sports competition with more than 200 teams, representing sovereign states and territories, participating. By default, the Games generally substitute for any world championships during the year in which they take place (however, each class usually maintains its own records).^[2] The Olympic Games are held every four years. Since 1994, they have alternated between the Summer and Winter Olympics every two years during the four-year Olympiad.^[3][4]

Their creation was inspired by the ancient Olympic Games, held in Olympia, Greece from the 8th century BC to the 4th century AD. Baron Pierre de Coubertin founded the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in 1894, leading to the first modern Games in Athens in 1896.

This year’s games, held in Paris, offer us all an opportunity to come together and simultaneously route for our own nation’s teams. It certainly offers us an exciting alternative to merely enduring the oppressive heat and humidity that July and August offer those of us living north of the equator!

At least a couple of poets have found inspiration in the Summer Games:

Summer Olympics Look, a Poem

J. Allyn Rosser

Only five of us were arguing about the score
of a forward one-and-a-half triple twist
with absolutely rip entry, executed
by an unpronounceable stiff-stepping Russian,
because the sixth was busy in the kitchen.
I couldn’t help noticing how Jane had made
every surface sparkle, clutter-free, neat tray
of snacks, napkins fanned on the coffee table,
fresh daisies on the mantel and by the door.
The Russian’s entry was smooth, minimal splash,
but his come out had been a tiny bit clumsy.
So Jane’s future ex-husband said, anyway,
and when he called out that he wouldn’t mind
another beer as long as she was up,
and she called back that she’d just brought him one,
he had to say something.  Because there it stood,
still frosty, darkening the coaster at his elbow.
He said now that’s the sign of a good wife,
like a good waitress, you’re hardly even aware
when she’s there.  By now Jane had entered,
her arms crossed in a kind of tuck position.
Her approach was understated but forceful,
and the deftness of the look she sent him
when he finally looked up at her
was so pure and deep and swift, it left
hardly a ripple there in the room among us.

Courtesy of Smithsonian Magazine, July 2012

the next Olympics 

a firefly 

wheels into the night 

Kala Ramesh – India

courtesy of A Hundred Gourds 3:3 June 2014

Today, let’s celebrate the Summer Olympics 2024! Write your haibun that alludes to this year’s Summer Games in Paris.

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 2024 Summer Olympics (Paris).
• 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!