Above the Spillway by Tom Painting

Above the Spillway

fall planting
the way my father
set them straight

a skim of ice
above the spillway
quaking aspen

crickets
the pulse in a hollow
of her neck

the angle
of the fruit picker’s ladder
autumn light

monastery wall
the smell of wild grapes
fermenting

the gossip
her yard fills
with leaves

a dry leaf
scratches along the sidewalk
All Souls’ Day

autumn clarity
the things I remember
in part true

Above the Spillway is a haiku sequence composed of autumnal images that were lurking among the twelve journals, representing the twelve Institute for Writing and Thinking workshops I have taken dating to 1992.

The inspiration for Above the Spillway came from the Fictions: Memory and Imagination workshop and a prompt based on the first line of “A Father’s Story” by André Dubus.

My name is _____ and here is what I call my life...

English language haiku is defined as a moment keenly perceived in which nature is juxtaposed with human nature… usually written in three lines of 17 or fewer syllables. Haiku should feature a “kigo” or seasonal reference word or phrase.

In this “experiment” I am thinking that a series of haiku can be linked in such a way as to act as stanzas and create a loose narrative thread.