Today’s post is perhaps the most difficult. There were SO MANY haiku and other short poems that we loved, and yet we can only represent a handful as honorable mention. The judges’ unanimity held together just long enough to bring some notes together on these poems. I hope you enjoy them as much as I did!
dangling upon a leaf
awaits the miracle
Keith A. Simmonds
Crayford, U.K.
Judges’ Comments: Love the imagery. Metamorphosis, with all of its complexity, really can seem miraculous. In this scene the protagonist awaits transformation from (what could be interpreted as) a nasty caterpillar to (what are often described as) a beautiful adult. The spiritual motifs here are effective devices for representing (perhaps) the poet’s vision of what to an entomologist is an every day event – just one stage of a holometabolan’s natural life.
a honey bee lingers
at Saint Francis’ feet
Catherine J.S. Lee
Eastport, ME
Judges’ Comments: Saint Francis of Assisi is patron saint of animals. The honey bee, lingering, seeks rescue from the disorder that is Colony Collapse Disorder.
B. trigona mixes clicks,
jamming – survival
Sharon Silcox
Garner, NC
Judges’ Comments: Mixes, clicks, jamming … this is the vocabulary of music and sound, and yet the scene in engulfed by silence (to us). The choppiness of the words mimics the action it describes – the bouncing flights of a bat and its prey, a moth. The poem ends with “survival” but no punctuation; clearly the story, like evolution, continues. This poem is probably the best combination of science and art we read – every syllable, punctuation, meaning, imagery, etc. is purposeful.

abandon your tender skins
happy robins await
Angie Werren
Amelia OH
Judges’ Comments: Can sense the heat of summer in that first line; in the 2nd line they shed a layer, almost as if to cool off, but then they’re vulnerable and get eaten.
among the tangled flies
a cicada’s husk
Pat Tompkins
San Mateo, CA
Judges’ comments: We love the mood, which suggests a passage of time through still objects; more than one “insect” is represented (flies and cicada); hints at spring, not in the usual way but through things that were left to sit over the winter and now need attention.
her joy
at a bee!
Helen Buckingham
Bristol, UK
Judges’ comments: Very short and sweet. A true haiku in terms of its simplicity and celebration of emotion – representing a brief moment in time but eliciting complex emotions.
And finally (but not least) a couple of the myriad wonderful poems we received from the vast Balkan haiku plains:
a ladybird returns
to the starting point
Eduard Tara
Iasi, Romania
tot univesul este
o buburuza
the whole universe
is a lady bird
Tania Nicolescu
Tulcea, Romania














