Tag Archives: NaHaiWriMo

February 2013 NaHaiWriMo

Poetry 3 Comments

Back in February of 2011, Michael Dylan Welch, created the NaHaiWriMo daily haiku writing challenge on Facebook, as a way of encouraging haiku poets to develop a daily writing habit. The response was overwhelming!

Although originally conceived of as a one-time 28 day challenge, due to popular demand, NaHaWriMo has continued daily, with different haiku poets providing the prompts,  since February 2011. (I was the May 2011 prompter.) The number of participants has grown to over 1200; they range from new haiku poets, to those who have been writing for decades. All are welcome (there are newcomers all the time), and the NaHaiWriMo community is very supportive. This will be my third year participating. I will posting my haiku on the NaHaiWriMo FB wall, the HSA Oregon FB wall, and also here on my blog.

Michael has created a NaHaiWriMo website to provide  information about the challenge, including how to participate. February attracts the greatest number of participants, and the first four prompts have already been posted. (Prompts are generally posted one day in advance, to accomodate those in other time zones. This is an international community.)

Hope to see you there!

barefoot summer

Poetry 59 Comments

December Haiku Share

This has got to be my most workshopped haiku. It generated quite a discussion when it first appeared on NaHaiWriMo back in April 2011. Later that year, it was workshopped again at a late night haiku session at the Bend Haiku Weekend. And it received a little streamlining when I submitted it to the anthology for the HNA conference. Interestingly enough, the final version is not so different from the original!

barefoot summer…
a drop of honeysuckle
on my tongue

NaHaiWriMo, April 2011
Standing Still: HNA Conference Anthology, Aug. 2011

Share a haiku about a childhood summer memory, summer in general, honeysuckle, nectar, or the sense of taste. If you missed the initial post, click here to read about the month long haiku challenge I am holding right here on my blog this December.

With Cherries on Top

Poetry 2 Comments

If it hadn’t been for discovering NaHaiWriMo (National Haiku Writing Month) in February 2011, it’s likely that I’d still be writing haiku on the back of grocery store receipts and index cards. What a wonderful haiku community Michael Dylan Welch has created! I’m pleased to be part of this first showcase of haiku, put together from a selection of the August 2012 NaHaiWriMo prompts and responses. I was the Day 25 prompter (in honor of my father’s birthday), and got to select my favorites from that day for inclusion in the collection. In addition, the following haiku of mine were selected to appear:

leaving home
my first taste
of chili peppers
(Day 15 prompt: “chili pepper”, selected by Paul David Mena)


buying time
we feed the meter
another coin
(Day 26 prompt: “time”, selected by Jessica Tremblay)


blue moon
a half-remembered story
from long ago
(Day 31 prompt: “moonviewing”, selected by Alex Benedict)

The entire collection, With Cherries on Top, can be downloaded (for free!) from here.