still some swagger
in his white linen trousers
the summer wind
Published by
Lorin Ford
Growing up first in the Seaford Beach/Kananook Creek area and then in Cann River, Croajingolong country, East Gippsland, formed Lorin's sense of belonging to the natural world. Lorin began writing haiku in 2004. She served on the judging panel for the Haiku Dreaming Awards (2009), on the The Haiku Foundation's Touchstone Books Awards Panel (2010, 2011 and 2012) and was co-judge with Lee Gurga for the H.S.A.'s 2018 Henderson Haiku Awards. Lorin was haiku editor for the first nine (quarterly) issues of Notes From the Gean (2009 - 2011) and subsequently publisher of A Hundred Gourds (2011 - 2016) where she served as haiku editor, features editor, managing editor and in other editorial roles. In 2014 she founded the 'Red Kelpie Haiku Group' (Melbourne, Australia), convening four meetings each year until the group broke up subsequent to its twentieth meeting in June 2019. Over the years, Lorin's haiku have received awards and been included in excellent anthologies. Books Published: 'a wattle seedpod' (Post Pressed, Teneriffe, Qld, Australia, 2008); e-chapbooks: 'what light there is' (3Lights Gallery, 2009) and 'A Few Quick Brushstrokes', a winner of the Snapshot Press e-chapbook competition, 2011. All three publications are available online, free of charge. View all posts by Lorin Ford
Poignant and full of (e)motion! Thank you for writing it.
This is so good, Lorin. My mind goes many places with this one.
Carole
very nice, thank you
I particularly like that middle line because of its pacing. The right pacing in a line of poetry is like a deep glass of the best vintage Bordeaux or Burgundy to me because it has to assault the senses so much that time stops in a most glorious way.
Alan
This is a classic haiku, Lorin. It could have been written by Basho! Such vivid imagery. But with an understated "sting in the tail" for those who are prepared to wait for it.
My initial reaction was one of humour, at the apparent lightness. Trousers dancing on the clothesline in the wind, and a slightly wry deprecation of "his" swagger.
But afterwards, I dwelt more on the images that came into my mind – and a sense of sabi melancholy settled on me. I find there is always something deeply poignant about washing on a clothesline. We hang there aspects of our selves – both the outer clothes we present to the world – our swaggering trousers, for instance – and the private inner underclothes we wear, which is also often where we hide certain vulnerable aspects of ourselves. The phrase "still some swagger" actually seems to imply just such a vulnerability – a gradual change is taking place through the aging process. The swagger is in the trousers, no longer in the man. The season is still summer, but I suspect late summer. The autumn of life is immanent.
Thank you for sharing such a bittersweet haiku.
Ahhh – a great one, Lorin.
marion
Beautiful Lorin :) Maire
Love it!
I like the pivot effect of the middle line and the shades of meaning that implies.
Very nice: I like the use of "swagger" because it resonates with the wind and the whole poem. Several months ago I wrote this haiku for the 8th International Kukai where the prompt was "white" and thought I would share it due to the use of white & clothes:
summer heat
all his youth in
that white t-shirt
Beautiful Lorin.