Global Haiku • Fall 2024
Dr. Randy Brooks

Fragments

by
Natalie Mase

As an artist, I am always telling stories. I am training to become a professional actor, and one of the first lessons we learn is about the importance of giving a story a beginning, a middle, and an end. While I still value this lesson very much, I think that sometimes just a small snapshot in time can be just as impactful as a whole, fluid arc.

As I’ve taken the Global Haiku seminar at Millikin, I’ve learned to fall in love with the art of haiku and the way it can so wonderfully capture these small moments. Whether they are memories, observations, or just silly little thoughts that pop into my head, I have found so much joy in capturing them in these brief poems.

The following haiku are just a small collection of fragments from my own life, but they are just that. Fragments. They never tell the whole story because I believe that part of the beauty of haiku is its ambiguity. We are able to share parts of ourselves while allowing others to see their own experience reflected in what they read. Anyone could read any of these haiku and see themselves in them–even if it is just a fragment. I hope you can see yourself too.

reflections . . .
old versions of me
rise to the surface

notches in the door frame
the marks
of childhood

pie for breakfast
grandma says
she won’t tell

unsent love letters
my desk drawer
receives them all

     friendship necklace
an angel rests
     over my beating heart

late night gossip
we giggle
little girls again

best friends
you know me better
than I know myself

rose garden
of all the flowers
he picked me

dancing barefoot
more calluses
than I can count

silent night
my only companion
the moon

rain-soaked park bench
our initials
still etched underneath

shattered picture frame
fragments
of who I once was

texting mom
letters
from the warfront

handprint on the map
the funny shape
of home