dinner for two
between our silence
the oyster shells
Chrysanthemum Love, 2003
Fay Aoyagi
Chinese Translation (Traditional)
兩人晚餐
在我們的沉默之間
是一堆牡蠣殼
Chinese Translation (Simplified)
两人晚餐
在我们的沉默之间
是一堆牡蛎壳
Bio Sketch
Fay
Aoyagi （青柳飛）was born in Tokyo and immigrated to the U.S. in 1982. She
is currently a member of Haiku Society of America and Haiku Poets of
Northern California. She serves as an associate editor of The Heron's Nest.
She also writes in Japanese and belongs to two Japanese haiku groups;
Ten'I (天為) and "Aki"（秋), and she is a member of Haijin Kyokai (俳人協会).
The contrasting acts (of eating seafood vs of not talking to each other) portrayed in this dinner haiku are visually and emotionally poignant.
ReplyDeleteAnd my tanka prose could be read as a foreshadowing of the untold story implied in Fay's haiku:
"Hungry"
When I first tasted her kiss, it was like spring water coming from the green slopes of a hill. For six years, her succulent words quenched my thirst. Now, the spring of our life starts to run dry.
she tells a lie
to conceal another
at the banquet
I stack oyster shells
one inside the other
Contemporary Haibun Online, 12:2, July 2016
Chen-ou Liu