Friday, March 13, 2015

The Water Ouzel

                                                                                         jhhymasphoto

Jim chose as his haiku name "Ouzel" for the water ouzel, or American Dipper, 
a small bird that looks for edible morsels in the waters of shallow running streams.
Those are his knees in the pictures, and some of our hands.

This is the basket of beautiful stones he brought to one of our
Haiku Retreats at Asilomar, so we could each chose.
I still have mine. I think this was at one of the last retreats he attended
before his sudden, unexpected and accidental death. jhh
  
For Ouzel
    
of all the human
figures on the beach
the one not there

he holds out to us
baskets of colored stones
—waters of autumn

in its evening flight
the crow’s swift certitude
—autumn deepens

first killing frost—
a dream of impossible choices
among smooth stones

June Hopper Hymas
  
(This was my memorial sequence for him.)

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