Haibun Monday – Walk

Bjorn is our host today, giving us our prompt for our haibun today. He wants us to share a walk we have taken – a daily walk, pilgrimage, tour…a walk! Share details, feelings – all involved with the walk. This is like a mini-travelogue. Come join us at dVerse today, walk with us, talk with us.

copyright kanzensakura

Daily Ramble

Every day, regardless of the weather, I walk.  Mostly I walk down our lane to finish at the creek at the bottom of the hill.  Muddy from spring storms, clear and rimmed with ice, sleepy in the early morning – this place is a refuge.  In the summer, the lane is shaded with thick ancient oaks and maple and in the green light of the woods, you can breathe in the cool breathe of the trees and undergrowth. During a rain, the raindrops tap on the leaves and make them dance. Squirrels jump from tree to tree, birds chirp and flutter in the safety of their private cathedral.  Autumn the smell is spicy with fallen leaves and the light filtering through the trees is golden and calm.  Snow sticks to the bare limbs and covers the ground beneath the trees in winter.  Sepia, white, and the dark green of cedar are the colors of winter.  Tracks of deer and raccoons break the smooth white of the snow.

Tender green bursts forth in the spring.  The cycle begins anew.  Daffodils gone wild rise beneath the trees, survivors of a long gone farm.  A cabin in ruins is part of the landscape of this walk.  Wild white roses and white blooms of blackberry vines are thick and fragrant.  Sometimes I take this walk at night.  The muscular sound of an owl rising to hunt breaks the silence.  Peepers who live at the creek stop their night music until the threat passes.  Summer smells of night blooming jasmine and honeysuckle entice me on my night ramble to walk farther, to walk to the creek.  In the winter, snow coats my hair and coat.  At times I will walk through snow and others, I walk before the snow begins to stick.  Sometimes I startle deer in their walk to the creek.

Moonlight sparkles on the black water – all the seasons.  The creek will whisper slow lullabies, sing a bluesy burble, or sing double time, a laughing aria.  I know these woods and the creek through all the seasons, all the times of day and night.  Sometimes in my dreams I walk this walk and often, leave the ground to walk among the watching stars, trying to catch meteors or wade in the River of Heaven** as it swirls in the black sky.  To the creek, to the River of Heaven – my walk.

cedars and jasmine
cool water and spicy leaves –
stars and trees true friends.

copyright kanzensakura

**River of Heaven – Amanogawa, Japanese name for the Milky Way