wild geese

wild geese

our mothers

calling us home 

I'm very happy that this haiku was chosen for the fall issue of Acorn haiku journal. I love their format—so solid and simple and easy to hold. I had such a wonderful conversation, via email, with editor Sue Antolin about haiku in general and this haiku in particular, that I decided to include it here:

Dear Holli,

Thank you for your submission. I am delighted to accept for the fall issue of Acorn your haiku:

wild geese
our mothers
calling us home 

I keep returning to this one. It seems that depending on the reader, one might associate the sound of the wild geese with the mothers' voices but also with the sounds of kids playing. And there's just something lovely about that last line, "calling us home," that almost implies a spiritual meaning as well. An excellent haiku!

All best wishes,

Sue

Thank you so much, Sue! I'm honored to be included. 🙏🏼 I like that one too. It's funny because when it came to me, it was the sound of the mother's voices I was hearing, but you are right, the wild geese could also be the sound of children at play. I was remembering being a kid and hearing my mother calling us in for supper, such a comforting memory. 

Also influencing this haiku is Mary Oliver's "Wild Geese" poem, which I memorized several years ago. I often recite it to myself when I can't sleep. I love the idea that the wild geese are "announcing your place in the family of things." This is one of the main reasons I write haiku, to experience and pay attention to how everything truly is connected and how wonderful it is to be part of this big family. 

In that way, you are also correct about the spiritual meaning of "calling us home." I think I was trying to get at the idea that if I listen to the geese (or the cherry blossom or the small stone or the red oak), they will have something important to tell me and they can help me "overcome my illusion of separateness" as Thich Nhat Hanh would say. This is actually something that my mom taught me as well. 

So Mary Oliver, Thich Nhat Hanh, my mom, and the geese are all calling me home, giving me guidance to my true nature where I am part of things and no longer have to bear the burden of dominion over things. For this I certainly need the raucous and insistent call of the wild goose, which is a Celtic symbol for the holy spirit, as it happens. When my boys were young, whenever the wild geese would fly over, honking, the boys would stop what they were doing and look up or go outside to catch a glimpse of them. That's what I need. Something that can get me to look up from my phone or the day's headlines and remind me what's real.  

All of that crammed in only 9 syllables! 😉 Ahh, the magic of haiku! 

Thanks again!

Holli

Hi Holli,

Wow! You express it all so beautifully! I don't know if you write essays, but it feels like you have a lovely essay lurking in there about the magic of haiku to capture so much in so few words. I love Mary Oliver's poem, too. And I love the way you describe the desire to feel your connectedness to the world. I am so moved. Truly.

Thank you for sharing this with me. This is what makes the job of editing so rewarding.

With gratitude,

Sue

Thanks so much for your kind words, Sue. I was a little worried about saying too much and taking up too much of your time. I can go on and on sometimes. LoL. In fact, writing haiku is a good discipline for me because it forces me to get down to the bare bones and trust the reader to fill in the rest. 😉 Thank you for reading, responding, and encouraging.

I feel like I should share this with you since it landed in my inbox yesterday and adds another dimension to this topic, the idea of interbeing and the way it connects us to the earth and to each other. 

Cheers,

Holli

From the Center for Action and Contemplation 9/4/24: 

Author bell hooks (1952–2021) describes how her childhood in the Kentucky hills instructed her in the spiritual lesson of interbeing: 

Growing up in a world where my grandparents did not hold regular jobs but made their living digging and selling fishing worms, growing food, raising chickens, I was ever mindful of an alternative to the capitalist system that destroyed nature’s abundance. In that world I learned experientially the concept of interbeing, which Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh talks about as that recognition of the connectedness of all human life.   

That sense of interbeing was once intimately understood by black folks in the agrarian South. Nowadays it is only those who maintain our bonds to the land, to nature, who keep our vows of living in harmony with the environment, who draw spiritual strength from nature…. It is nature that reminds time and time again that “this too will pass.” To look upon a tree, or a hilly waterfall, that has stood the test of time can renew the spirit. To watch plants rise from the earth with no special tending reawakens our sense of awe and wonder.

bell hooks, Belonging: A Culture of Place (New York: Routledge, 2009), 118–119. 

Hi Holli,

Thank you for sharing this with me! bell hooks is so good. Isn't it just magical the way your haiku contains so much within it?! The best haiku are like that. You could read it and breeze right by or you can pause and find so much meaning. I think it depends on where the reader is in their life. I lost my mother last summer and am especially moved now by poems mentioning mothers. And I seem to live right along the flight path of geese that head to their evening spot with a lot of loud honking. You've made new connections for me with the sound of the geese. Thank you for your poem and for your generous sharing of your thoughts and bell hooks' writing on interbeing. It's such a rich topic! 

All best wishes,

Sue