First Steps

each ginger movement
is the first step I take...
snow-covered sidewalk

Certainly not the best I've written, but it's about beginnings and that's what I'm doing.

A haiku blog? Well... yeah. I'm looking for a way to keep my poetic sense going. I used to write poetry a lot, had a few pieces published, including some in Modern Haiku. Poetry is like a muscle I need to use or it atrophies.

So, when I decided to do this, I thought if I write a haiku a day, it will use that muscle and will surely help my other writing. I had a wonderful writing teacher (wonderful both as a teacher and as a person) who said that someday I would have to choose between poetry and playwriting. Theatre and playwriting had already kind of chosen me, so I went with that. Every once in a while I would have a haiku pop into my head, but they didn't amount to a large body of work.

I don't know what this will amount to, either, but I'm following its path for the moment.

Will it be all haiku and only haiku? No... obviously... already... because not all of life is haiku, or poetry, or writing... although all of life becomes part of writing. Some traditional, some not so much, but all to help me focus.

Part of my intention is to kill time while I look for a job. It's mighty discouraging out there right now and I need some way to express myself other than "I am sooo great, you should hire me sight unseen" cover letters.

When I was looking for a way to start this, I thought about first steps. A baby's first steps are shaky and unsteady, like walking on ice. So, that led me to the sidewalk, which is not snow-covered at the moment, but last year, it slipped out from under me and I landed squarely on my back. Ever since, I have been a bit more cautious with it, and each step is more like a child's first, tentative attempts at moving forward.

So, I'm moving forward. Step by ginger step.