Our host at Carpe Diem’s prompt is “A Departed Soul”. Many of the great masters of haiku wrote “death poems” about their own deaths. One of the “big five” who delivered haiku, Shiki wrote this on his deathbed:
sponge gourd has bloomed
choked by phlegm
a departed soul
© Shiki
having gazed at the moon
I depart from this life
with a blessing
© Basho
and our host writes:
morning dew
evaporates in the early sunlight
spirit climbs to the sky
@ Chevreuille
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
crossing (haibun)
I love our host’s haiku because it reminds me of my GrandPapa who passed June 17th during the day. I don’t remember if it was morning but the “morning dew” makes me think of the river where we were brought up and where my grandfather died in his home.
The dove is often represented in “death” but its significance is more personal to me. In French the translation for “dove” is Colombe which is my mother’s name.
I love daisies. I feel connected to this flower as the petals represent the multiplicity of my personality. The layer of petals beneath the top layer are facets to be discovered throughout a lifetime. I remember, when working in homecare, how sad I would feel when a client passed. Weeks and months caring for a person in their homes was humbling for them and such a loss when they died. After a few years, I wrote to my supervisor that I could no longer continue working in this department for each person who died, I felt a petal from the daisy fall. If I continue, what will be left of me?
Here is my attempt in writing a haiku with this tone of “death poems”:
on the river
a petal floats
crossing over
~
river breeze
wings of a dove
whoosh
© Tournesol’14
This was my response to this prompt when originally posted in July 2014 “Departed Soul (haibun)
Tournesol dans un Jardin 
What a beautiful explanation and beautiful poems!
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Thanks Pam, so glad you enjoyed this post. Hope you are doing well…soaking up the warm weather before the snow.
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I love the light even in the shadows of death – nicely done haibun
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Thank you so much:)
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They are all lovely the ones you wrote espec spirit t climbs to the sky xx
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Thank you, that was our host Chèvrefeuille`s haiku, it IS beautiful and so hopeful
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😀 ❤
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I LOVE the “Whoosh”–oh my!
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(smiles) so glad you do…I`m happy I found that word:)
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I love your first haiku about the leaf crossing ove. Beautifully stated. Wish I had written this one. Enjoyed you write up as well.
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What a nice compliment!! Thank you so much:)
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This is a very moving haibun and the haiku are splendid .. I love the vision of the river flowing …
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Me too, water breathes life
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So true!
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Two wonderful death poems Cheryl, but your first is breathtaking.
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Thank you…the first is my death, the second is my mother welcoming me
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It wasn’t an easy prompt … writing your own deathpoem isn’t easy, but sometimes it’s worth to be challenged ….
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Years ago studying for my Gerontology certificate, we had to write a bit about that…it made a difference how we wanted to spend our lives and be remembered too. the challenge here was reducing the amount of words but when I saw a petal fly off my fav daisy by the side of la rivière Yamaska, it all came together.
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