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Instead of a book review

Ikumi (Ikuyo) Yoshimura, elephant's eyes (Rainbow Press, Oonawaba 4, Gifu 500-8889 Japan)

Haiku is a snapshot of a scene or intuition from our daily life. These haiku were composed in 2005 and 2006. Some of them were carried Evergreen, HI, Hermitage Haiku Journal, Simply Haiku and photo-haiku KAWAI calendar. Mr. Hirotaka Kawai, president of KAWAI MUSICAL INSTRUMENT fg., likes to take photos during his traveling overseas. Putting my haiku to his photos, the collaboration makes some imaginary space such as haiku and haiga. We can make fancy collaboration. However, the photos aren't printed in this book. I hope you enjoy reading our adventurous trial in some of my haiku. I tried composing haiku in English first and translated into Japanese. Japanese translation is added by notation in Roman letters. I think it might be useful for the persons who study the Japanese language.

Ikumi (Ikuyo) Yushimura
January 5, 2007

Editor's selection

SPRING

like elephant's eyes
spring moon heals
my sorrow

to and fro
a butterfly leads me
to the pagoda

SUMMER

baseball kid
catches and throws
a cloudy sky

early summer –
my footprints lightly
at the cathedral

AUTUMN

autumn breeze –
wearing mother's kimono
I become gentle

sounds of autumn
rolling about
at terminal station

WINTER

nobody passes
across the leek field
except the moon

waiting for a person –
light shadow
of falling snow