Brooks Books in the USA has released Another Trip Around the Sun: 365 Days of Haiku for Children Young and Old, edited by Jessica Malone Latham. And this book delivers exactly what it says – one haiku for each day of the year, with each poem capturing the spirit of discovery, the magic of a new experience, either through the eyes of a child, or through those of an adult.

By traversing each day of the year, the poems in this collection capture the seasonal essence of traditional haiku. But it is the ‘young and old’ aspect of this book that sets it apart.

As Jessica says, ‘Children are easily able to tap into life’s wonder’. And many of these wondrous moments are captured by haiku in the book. The freshness of those poems depicting child-like discovery provide a counterpoint to those haiku written from a more weather-worn perspective, or those haiku where an adult learns again to see the world with the joy of a child.

The contrasting of these young and old experiences energises the collection and brings an extra dimension to the passing of the seasons. Some haiku from Another Trip Around the Sun:

May 2

by themselves
the camellia blossoms
all fall down

(Mimi Ahern)

May 29

in love again
poplar fluff
floating through the air

(Olivier Schopfer)

November 6

crescent moon
a child asks
if it’s broken

(Lucy Whitehead)

Of course, the nature of the seasons varies between a temperate climate or tropical climate, northern hemisphere or southern. So, for consistency, Another Trip Around the Sun follows a standard northern hemisphere pattern throughout. While some 80 poets are represented in the collection, the vast majority are from the northern hemisphere. For southern hemisphere poets, like myself, the haiku have been located to match the northern seasons. Here is one of my haiku and one from the editor, Jessica Malone Latham:

November 9

taking the short way
the toes of her shoes
damp with dew

(Gregory Piko)

December 12

falling snow
how quietly you take root
in my womb

(Jessica Malone Latham)

Another Trip Around the Sun: 365 Days of Haiku for Children Young and Old is a paperback edition of 184 pages. You can purchase a copy here.