Weeping Cherry by Naia
We welcome the spring in the Poetry letter.with a beautiful haiga of a Weeping Cherry by our featured poet, California haiku master, Naia. She submitted for our enjoyment her previously published haiku, haiga, cinquain, and haibun. A delight for the eyes and for the mind! Her haiku-colleague William Scott Galasso decided to share not his haiku or haibun, but free-verse poems from his newest book, The Year We Never Saw Coming (2024). A review of his impressive book was contributed by Joe DeCenzo. Two other reviews by Michael Escoubas present the poems and prose of Mark Fleisher (Persons of Interest) and of Pamela Miller (How to Do the Greased Wombat Slide). The latter has the most original title of any poetry volume we featured in this Poetry Letter. The final poet, Charlene Langfur of Palm Springs, often writes about her garden and “her” desert, seen in a different way by featured artist, Polish American painter, Joanna Fodczuk-Garcia, The artwork includes four haiga by Naia and seven paintings from the Desertscape series by Fodczuk-Garcia. The final pages of this issue are dedicated to announcements – already a year has passed and the deadline for the 38th Annual Contest is on 30 June 2025. We do not have the judge yet, but poems are adjudicated anonymously, so knowing the judge’s identity is not essential, A reminder about our Monthly Poetry Contest is also enclosed. Poets can keep very busy this spring!
FEATURED POET - NAIA
Naia is a 5th generation native Californian. She discovered haiku in 1998 and joined the Southern California Haiku Study Group shortly after it was founded by Jerry Ball. Her haiku, tanka, haiga, haibun, rengay, cinquain, and split sequences have been published in a wide variety of journals and anthologies in the US and internationally, including the Basho Festival Anthology (Japan, 2001) and The Ehime Culture Foundation 2001 Shiki Anthology (Japan).
Naia co-founded Haiku San Diego in 2010 and is the group's moderator. Beginning in 2010 and for several years thereafter, she served as California Regional Coordinator for the Haiku Society of America. Naia co-edited the Haiku Society of America's 2002 anthology titled bits of itself, and edited the 2008, 2009, and 2016 anthologies for the Southern California Haiku Study Group. Naia was co-chair for the 2013 Haiku North America Conference in Long Beach, CA, held on board the Queen Mary. She was a guest reader for both the Yuki Teikei Haiku Society's annual "Tea House Reading" (May 2012), and the Haiku Poets of Northern California's annual "Two Autumns Reading" (September 2012).
NAIA'S POETRY
hinged shoji
softly the sound
of his grief
Frogpond, Vol. 45:3, Autumn 2022
slight list
of the painter’s easel
buoy bells
Kingfisher, Issue #5
dewdrops
on this one too
unmarked grave
Modern Haiku, Issue 53:1
withered violets
the things I thought
I knew
Haiku Society of America Members’ Anthology, 2021
new love
still some green
in these autumn leaves
The Heron’s Nest, Vol. V, No. 1 (January 2003)
leaves in the wind
this time
I let him go
A Vast Sky: An Anthology of Contemporary International Haiku,
Bruce Ross editor, Tuttle Publishing, North Clarendon, VT, 2014
heirloom crib
three generations
of tooth marks
Frogpond, Vol. 35.2, Spring-Summer 2012
leaving the cabin
for the last time
pine dust on my shoes
Acorn, Issue #7, Fall 2001
buoy bells
her plan to forget one man
with another
Close to the Wind, Haiku North America Anthology, 2013
summer night
slowly he disappears
into cicada song
The Scent of Music: Haiku with a Touch of Music,
editor Marlène Buitelaar, ‘t schrijverke
Publishing House, Den Bosch Netherlands, 2013
Aurora Borealis
he describes it
without blinking
Simply Haiku, Vol. 4, No. 3, 2006
songbird
even the crow in the next tree
listens
Basho Festival Anthology, 2001, Japan
MARIGOLDS
Their back yards face the railroad tracks, and I wonder how many times each day their privacy is invaded by strangers like me, on a long journey with no intent beyond staring out. If ever my back yard faces the railroad tracks, I hope those staring-out folks don’t mind seeing a nude old woman, watering her marigolds.
deepening autumn
my life begins to fall
into place
San Diego Poetry Annual, Spring 2013-14
STRANGERS ON A TRAIN
Our seats face each other. I glance at him now and then, the man three rows up. He appears half Asian, his long black hair with its here-and-there streaks of early gray pulled back and fastened at the neck. I hear his phone call telling her (I imagine it’s her) telling her that he’ll be standing just outside the train station. And I imagine it’s me driving to meet him, driving with anticipation, as if we were lovers parted too long.
gypsy moth
this longing for
my wandering days
San Diego Poetry Annual, Spring 2012-13
GHOSTS AMONG THE CORNFLOWERS
From this place at the edge of a cornflower patch so wide that it seems as if a great wave poured from the afternoon sky and liquefied the land . . . from this place, I begin to wonder. Who planted them? Who knelt here, tended here, bent and yielded here, dreamed here? Who planted these cornflowers gone to seed, to weed, again and again, until this knee-deep sea of them?
windswept cloud . . .
in blue ink the apology
owed since childhood
Frogpond, Vol. 35.2, Spring-Summer 2012
LOOKING UP INTO CORNFLOWER BLUEa 4-verse mirror cinquainHe’s there,in a distantplace, where snow stays on themountain and bells ring like coraltines, struckin pineair...where tigers lurk among soft,striped leaves, and wild lupinesreach up to piercethe sky.He’s there,in a distantplace, where honey’s suckledby tiny things that flit or buzzor float...with wingssometimes slow, fast, iridescent!Things with stingers, tongues, orfeelers cool tothe touch.He’s there,in a distantplace, where globe thistles bowand sway...where sundrops spin through acrystal,while thebachelor unbuttons its vestand rests in a headymaze of vividpink phlox.He’s there,in a distantplace, where thyme flowers creepthrough the veins of a maiden fernin stone...there, wherecolumbine angels peek beneathpetunia halos...there,reciting hispoems.Amaze: The Cinquain Journal, Vol. 3, No. 1,Spring-Summer 2004
Desertscape 1 by Joanna Fodczuk-Garcia. Acrylic on Canvas 77in X 12 in.
FEATURED POET WILLIAM SCOTT GALASSO
William Scott Galasso is the author of eighteen books of poetry, of which Rough Cut: Thirty Years of Senryu (2019), Saffron Skies (2022), and The Years We Never Saw Coming (2024), are the most recent. His verse has been published in 250 journals. He participated in 350 readings, and appeared on radio and TV programs in New York, Washington, New Mexico and California. Mr. Galasso co-edited Eclipse Moon, the 20th Anniversary issue of SCHSG, and served as an editor for the California Quarterly (Vol. 47, No. 4, Winter 2021). He’s a member of Marquis Who’s Who in America.
METHUSELAH
10,000 feet above sea level,
in the Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest
stands Methuselah, eldest of trees
pinus longaeva, seeded in 2833 B.C.,
older by three centuries
than the Pyramids of Giza
its locale kept secret for decades
thwarts men that flare like fireflies
eons that pass like whims
its arboreal wisdom knows what
we cannot, how to husband water
through drought, or stay in rhythm
when earth moves and keep its roots
in place, how to bear in silence, solitude
against the banshee wailing wind
and winter ice may chew its bark
and sear sun burn its branch
and constellations shift their gears
but the bristlecone pine endures
MURPHY’S
Cold rain slaps streets, a steady drumbeat,
sidewalk streams slick with oil cascade into
sewers. I stride with strict purpose in black
boots, wet black duster, black hat, blue denim,
towards the refuge of a local Irish pub.
A green, neon pixilated sign proclaims Harp
above a Celtic knot, another touts Guinness,
a third promises whiskey and comfort food.
I head to the fireplace, order a Tullamore Dew,
a black and tan, shake the rain from my hat
eschew the pool table, am soothed by rock
classics on the old jukebox. Regulars trickle
in and like the sit-com Cheers, the bartender
knows each name. Then a woman arrives
red hair, green flashing eyes, a young
Maureen O’Hara incarnate and the clock
on the wall just stops.
Desertscape 3 by Joanna
Fodczuk-Garcia. Acrylic on Canvas 77in X 12 in.
FOUR TANKA ON CITYSCAPE PAINTINGS BY HOPPER
(Edward Hopper, 1882-1967)
Hopper’s Nighthawks
who has not been, one alone
half in shadow
coffee cup cradled in hand
in a city full of strangers
a man and woman
sit at opposite tables
they don’t engage
Sunlight in a Cafeteria
silence fills the room
Automat in oil
nineteen twenty-seven
a woman, not old
fixates on her cup ‘a joe
if her eyes met yours, what then?
a Room in Brooklyn
windows filter morning light
a woman in blue
sits in a wooden rocker
miles of roof tops before her
SING TO YOUR BABY…
mothers, while she lies in your womb
upon arrival, on each day thereafter.
It’s not sound alone but rhythmic patterns
which waken the brain to speech.
If your register is low, sing your
mellow alto. If high, a soprano lullaby,
and fathers too must sing. Let bass or tenor
in sotto voce enter your child’s ear.
Let notes become words
harmonics fuse sound.
Let nursey rhymes matter
in the pitter patter of rhythm.
Infants can hear vocal stress,
can guess where one-word ends
another begins, the seed
of language is sewn this way.
So, sing bring joy to a soul reborn,
to bestow the gift of speech,
and if your key is slightly off,
who will know but you.
Desertscape 4 by Joanna Fodczuk-Garcia. 2018, Acrylic on Canvas 77in X 12 in.
DAYS WE’D TRADE FOR NO ONE’S
~ for Vicki
Near Amsterdam station, you spoke
three words, umbrellas fell to the streets,
or that honeymoon night in Venice
and the singer’s Al Di La.
And do you recall that day in Delos
the albatross soaring in skies,
or wading to shoulder height
in Iceland’s Blue Lagoon.
And how enthralled we were
witnessing Bard on the Beach,
Vancouver, as sail boats
cruised between tent flaps
And can you forget Kauai’s gardens,
or Sedona’s painted deserts, or
Gibraltar’s command of the coast
as thunder and lightning raged.
Or fail to remember Budapest,
waves on the Danube silver and gold,
as we stood on the riverboat’s deck
slowly sipping our cognac
Ten thousand days pass,
pins on maps multiply, facial
lines deepen, yet as clouds
migrate and hands clasp.
We’d trade these days for no one’s.
SING TO YOUR BABY…
mothers, while she lies in your womb
upon arrival, on each day thereafter.
It’s not sound alone but rhythmic patterns
which waken the brain to speech.
If your register is low, sing your
mellow alto. If high, a soprano lullaby,
and fathers too must sing. Let bass or tenor
in sotto voce enter your child’s ear.
Let notes become words
harmonics fuse sound.
Let nursey rhymes matter
in the pitter patter of rhythm.
Infants can hear vocal stress,
can guess where one-word ends
another begins, the seed
of language is sewn this way.
So, sing bring joy to a soul reborn,
to bestow the gift of speech,
and if your key is slightly off,
who will know but you.
Desertscape 5 by Joanna Fodczuk-Garcia, 2018, Acrylic on Canvas 77in X 12 in.
THIS IS HOW SHE SEES ME
I’m sitting on a plush gray chair
wearing a brown shirt, blue jeans,
and sandals.
Just to my left and in front
of me, there’s a small table
with a white vase housing
a purple orchid. Duet shades
behind me, let the light in.
A book rests on the left knee
of my crossed legs. Maybe it’s
*Hedin’s At the Great Door
of Morning, or Ida Limon’s
The Hurting Kind, or *Doerr’s
Cloud Cuckoo Land.
Whatever gem it is, I’m engaged.
My goatee points down, yet there’s
a subtle smile on my lips and dimples
on my cheeks.
This is how she sees me, my gifted,
artist wife--when I’m content to
feed my mind and willing to be still.
*Robert Hedin, *Anthony Doerr or *Doerr’s
William Scott Galasso
THE YEAR WE NEVER SAW COMING
2020, its sound has symmetry,
but infamy’s mark will cling to
its numeral, like a cross on a hill
and those who endure will not
forget this scythe unseen
born in a world, half-away
it is not the corona it’s a stalker stealing
surrounding sun, or breath without mercy
a nimbus rounding a killer floating on air
saint’s heads or God’s, it’s moisture staining
it is not the moon a worker’s hands, one
pregnant with promise love’s poisonous kiss
what can be done with such viral fury
which respects neither wisdom or age,
and who will it cull today, tomorrow
this cleaver of parents from children
whose hands on glass cannot touch
Desertscape 2 by Joanna Fodczuk-Garcia. Acrylic on Canvas 77in X 122 in.
FEATURED POET CHARLENE
LANGFUR
Charlene Langfur is a green and LGBTQ poet, an organic gardener living in the southern California desert for more than 20 years. Born in 1948 in Hackensack, New Jersey, she has published more than 300 poems from the 1960s to the present time, and she was a Syracuse University Graduate Writing Fellow in 1972, along with writers Mary Gordon and Stephen Dunn.
A POET’S MONET
Always my poems are part of my garden
the same as Monet’s paintings were part of his.
In his paintings the light is everything.
It was as simple as that, light and color.
He worked with love on his garden all the time
and said so to anyone who would listen.
The old farmhouse and the poor orchard in Giverny
began it all for him, planting, seeding, enlarging.
I know he dreamt of new plans at night as I do,
little maps of where sunflower seeds would thrive,
planting seeds in cans and cups in the sunshine,
creating tops for the little plants to keep them safe
here through the winter in the deep, deep desert.
Suppose I say Monet planted his lavender for grace,
made a purple paint to match the look and feel of them,
swayed the same way as the petals in the countryside,
and next to them, a cache of strawberries, maybe a woman
in a blue hat picking a bowl of them for supper,
gathering fruit and greens in the simple basket.
Surely this is about a green life in a needy world
He wanted color, more color, flowers blooming at night,
a lotus garden as big as the orangerie itself, the painting
as large and complete as the museum built to keep it in.
Always in my mind my garden is bigger than it is
as I think about its possibilities, ideas afloat,
another fan palm tree like the one I planted on my porch
and five years later it is taller than the house is,
its leaves akimbo, sweet green, nimble, wild and
near it, scores of nasturtium leaves round as circles,
lotus-like leaves about to bloom into delicate petals,
more lightly orange than any poem actually has words for
and the flowers will come in huge groups
and always like Monet I know there is always more,
another pot of aloe to start, a tiny tree to plant
and then waiting until tomorrow to see how it takes,
what happens next, the light all over the place, color galore,
yellow petals crazy with the light breaking free.
THE WAY BACK
How will we get past the trouble
when it is too deep to brook,
get past it any time at all in the dark
or in the light or in the middle
of June, under the half-moon when
the flowers on the orange trees
bloom like little stars, in a time
of first love like a time of dreams
when nothing is as what it seems, steady
or true, a time to rebuild a small world
that works, when I am trying to put
myself back together this way
in time, finding balance, wishing
everyone around me well no matter
what is happening to the world
at large at a time when the moon
rises over the mountains like
an old friend come to call at night,
one small touch of the light
in a big dark
Desertscape 6 by Joanna Fodczuk-Garcia. Acrylic on Canvas 77in X 122 in.
THE POEM IN THE MIDDLE OF EVERYWHERE
Some days I am exactly here with everything.
Chasing the obvious into the middle of nothing,
swaying like the fan palm trees in the desert wind,
sitting with flowers after the blooming comes,
orange nasturtium, delicate, evanescent lavender
blossoms, intricate, little, leaves that are elegant,true.
How else to know exactly how far I have come?
Past the wars on TV, the tanks and the drones,
the peace in one place, destruction in another one.
Choirs and bombs, money and nothing at all,
a lesbian’s long life, writing poems at dawn,
a lifetime passing in the blink of an eye,
betrayals and love all at the same moment
but here this winter in the desert where I am,
the winter garden on my porch flourishes
as if for the very first time, aloe, fluent, tall,
the tiny purple flowers on heather, giants to the eye.
PLANS AND ALL THAT
I know how to get by in life now,
adapt often, sing a little, talk to
my rescued dog about what to do
even as she looks at the birds
outside the window. This is it.
Working online eight hours a day.
Occasionally dreaming about
love again with all that comes with it,
friendship, sex, stupid laughter,
joy out of the blue. And I believe every
act matters, that planting seeds is political.
I’m dreaming about signs, omens, and
a brown hawk on the back porch,
guides to getting on with things.
Opening up at all is a part of the plan.
Wearing my green scarf on a windy day,
mulling over the climate changes as if
they are real and I’m trying to figure out what
to do on a small scale and remember
what will happen if we allow a bunch
of self-involved billionaires guide us
to take care of money but not of life,
planning for a safe life in a world of palm trees,
leaves blowing in the winter winds,
the purple lavender flowers glowing
in the winter sunshine like gems.
DO NOT MESS WITH THE LIGHT
This is how I use less now. I work at it.
I wake at the same time as my golden rescued dog.
She is big-hearted and magical and full of
problems and she is utterly smart, dog-smart.
We love each other so completely you may
confuse this all as a dream but I know it belongs here
in the poem when we are out walking in the wind
under the sun and under the moon, fat and full.
This month it is the famous blue moon and when
I get back to the house I cook the old-fashioned way
with fresh lentils and celery and carrots and
garlic, the imperative, a must, and bowtie pasta.
Later, when the moon rises over the purple mountains
over this ancient desert under the oasis palms,
palm trees with leaves the same as wings that lighten us.
And always we try to save what matters around us,
the soul of it, the green of it, how we have loved long
and risen early with the light and how we love one day
at a time, all the way through it, the small and
the all of it and today my dog will wear her flaming purple jacket
and I will wear my wild green gay kerchief for luck
and off we’ll go, ready to see the world, every bit of it,
far as we can go and all the way back again.
Desertscape 7 by Joanna Fodczuk-Garcia. Acrylic on Canvas 77in X 122 in.
PRIOR PUBLICATION CREDITS:
- "Plans and All That" appeared in Trajectory in 2025.
- "The Way Back" was included in Yellow Arrow Publishing in 2023 (nominated for best of the net).
- Langfur was invited to contribute to "A Poet's Monet" in Poetry East 2024 (Special issue on Monet.
- "Do Not Mess with the Light" was published in Pensive: A Global Journal of Spirituality in the next issue 2025.
- "A Poem in the Middle of Everywhere" first appeared in Vita Poetica in 2023 and was again highlighted in a special edition this month in 2025.
FEATURED ARTIST
Joanna Fodczuk-Garcia was born in Bielsko-Biała. Poland. She graduated from the Faculty of Painting at the Academy of Fine Arts in Poznań, where she studied under Professor Jerzy Kalucki. She resided in Los Angeles for a long time, and has since moved on to live and work in the Mojave Desert, CA. The artist has shown her works during numerous collective and individual exhibitions in Los Angeles, New York, and Bielsko-Biala. An abstract painter, who uses acrylics, oils, and watercolors.
“My paintings are an inner landscape, a personal map of my ways, which my reflections on life use to wander through gardens, skies, and deserts. I use the color as a language to express my thoughts. Sometimes it overflows through the painting and comes before me as an object, a painting installation. It takes on a new meaning.”
~ Joanna Fodczuk-Garcia
