I wrote this poem in honor of any non-Japanese who kept Japanese-American property safe on Bainbridge Island, WA, during the WWII Japanese-American Internment. If there even were any such people. Most other Americans ripped off J-A property, and bought their houses from the US government for cheap.
In order to round this poetry’s word count out to 200 words or more, a brief lesson on its form is required. The poetry below is informally titled “haiku,” which is a Japanese style of onomatopoeic poetry that also is supposed to conjure up an image or several images in your mind. Onomatopoeia refers to words such as “splash” that emblamize a sound. Some haiku is very set and determined in its metre, and is confined to a set amount of lines. The poem below is Americanized haiku, which means that it is more “free verse” in its styling, and that it’s not quite held to such strict standards.
One thing: I should warn you that the poem is not strictly about the Japanese American Internment. Instead, it contains imagery about Bainbridge Island that I found to be inspirational when I was visiting there a few years ago.
Are broken sideways.
The moon is the guide,
time and time again,
muddy as bean-paste
mixed with vinegar.
Oars hit waves.
My old self sits again,
with a bit of madness in me.
A big ball of snow,
not quite his fill;
piercing alarms to drive a badger away,
the beautiful pears ripe in his garden,
who my neighbor truly is.
In a way, it was fun not to see Mt. Fuji in foggy rain.
Immobilienmakler Heidelberg Makler HeidelbergSource by Karen S Cole