public domain – View of the Church of Saint Paul and Asylum at Remy – Van Gogh
I am writing a haibun and being untraditional by ending the prose portion with a senryu rather than haiku. This haibun is in response to a painting by Van Gogh which Bjorn, hosting our Haibun Monday at d’Verse Poets, asked us to use as our prompt for our haibun – .http://dversepoets.com/2015/11/02/haibun-monday-3/ I am also posting on Poets United for their Poetry Pantry http://poetryblogroll.blogspot.com/2015/11/poetry-pantry-275.html (Sunday) Come and visit me at both locations and read outstanding poetry by outstanding poets! Those of you who write prose and have not yet tried the Japanese poetry/prose form of haibun may be interested in trying your hand. At d’Verse Poets, the link is good for a week to submit haibun. Try it, you may like it! Come visit and read if nothing else for excellent reading material. http://dversepoets.com/2015/11/02/haibun-monday-3/
Blue and Gold Sunday
I was admitted to the Asylum at Saint Remy in August of 1889 because I had the poor taste and wicked disposition to allow my older brother to rape me several times a week after the family had retired for the evening. Even worse, after a few months, when enough had become too much, I stopped his attacks by taking a knife to him – a knife secreted from the kitchen and hidden under my pillow. What a mess! Blood spattered on the hand painted silk wall paper, the chaste white lace and linen of my bed and by a well-aimed and angry stroke, my brother became incapable of performing such an attack again. Running to find out what the screaming was all about, my parents, several servants, and my mama’s spinster sister, discovered my brother emasculated and slowly bleeding to death and me – covered with blood and voiceless. Since that night, I have not spoken and mostly spend my days staring inside myself at landscapes such as never existed on this earth. Our family doctor recommended the Asylum as a place far enough away from Paris for my parents to forget I existed. Our lawyer helped them silence the disgrace and make arrangements for my admittance. I would be surrounded by beautiful pastoral views and treated well by the good Sisters and the doctors.
And so here I am, sitting by the window of my small private room watching the morning sun gild the Sunday countryside, absorbed in the view of the Chapel. The sky is the unearthly blue of an alpine lake. Church bells begin to ring, their sound drifting over the unharvested wheat like gentle wood smoke. Last night, one of the attendants came to do his weekly visit. Klaus had become my brother in this quiet place. During a noisy outbreak at the end of the hall, I took my dinner knife, cleverly hidden up the sleeve of my kimono. I had patiently waited for such a happening. While everyone but lazy Klaus was occupied silencing the creator of the shrieks and mayhem, I took myself to the opposite end of the hall where he spent most of his time napping and smoking hand rolled cigarillos. He did not hear me as I stepped behind him and drew the knife across his throat. Stepping back quickly to avoid blood on myself, I dropped the knife and then returned to my room. I slept well. This morning, when the Sunday doctor asked me how I was doing, for the first time in four years, I spoke. I looked him in the eye and said, “I am feeling much better now” and smiled.
blue and gold Sunday –
madness departs to dissolve
into the blue sky.
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kanzen sakura 