10. Poet Fellows Reading
confluence invites you to celebrate our inaugural year of Poet Fellows and our growing community with a virtual poetry reading on Saturday June 21 at 10:00–11:30am Pacific (1:00–2:30pm Eastern, 6:00–7:30pm British Summer Time, 10:30pm–12:00am India Standard time).
Six confluence Fellows (Daniel Shank Cruz, David Green, Lorraine A Padden, Nicky Gutierrez, Rowan Beckett Minor, and Vandana Parashar) will read their poems and share about their inspirations.
As a journal dedicated to building the haiku community, confluence also offers our readers the opportunity to respond to the Fellows’ poems during the event, and for your responses to be published in the next confluence issue. To facilitate this, we have chosen to print in today's issue the works that the Fellows will read. We invite you to read and savor these pieces in advance, and to submit a written response to one or more of the poets for publication in our next issue. You can also sign up to respond to the poets during the live event or to read your own pieces during the open mic portion. For more details, visit the submission and sign-up page.
For all our subscribers, we will email the link to join the meeting a couple days in advance of the event. If you’re not yet a subscriber, join us for free at the confluence website.
Ryland Shengzhi Li, confluence co-editor
Daniel Shank Cruz
winter solstice
his sun tattoo
half under the sheet
Kingfisher 7 (April 2023)
when did the magnolia blossoms disappear campus protests
#FemkuMag 36 (Summer 2024)
Cold Moon
the tundra
of my depression
Blithe Spirit 35.1 (February 2025)
freezing night
a streetlight
dying
Acorn 54 (Spring 2025)
hospitalization
trying not to imagine
her death poem
morning subway cops surveilling their phones
budding moon the kidnappings continue
David Green
Back Porch
smaller once
cypresses and
daughters
Modern Haiku 55.3
first snow
footsteps falling lightly
down the hallway
Presence 78
wanderlust
tracing a finger through
sprinkled flour
The Heron’s Nest XXVI.2
garden quiet
ceramic fish circle
in the creeping jenny
Presence 79
new prescription
the leaf
becomes a bird
The Heron’s Nest XXVII.1
garden treasure
a crushed daisy
in a dixie cup
Atlanta Haiku Festival 2025, 3rd place (advanced division)
firefly night
my daughter’s eyes open and close
open and close
Fireflies’ Light 31
Neighborhood
lake buoys
the distance
between us
Modern Haiku 54.3
pollinator
i shoulder through
the coneflowers
Mayfly 78
jungle gym
no crows
to speak of
(after basho and hitchcock)
metro platform
as the cars pull away
sunrise . . . sunrise . . . sunrise
Kingfisher 10
morning jaunt
the sparrows play
musical bushes
knotweed I tailgate a student driver
One Art Haiku Anthology 2025
NYC
ellis island
hello kitty shoes
in ghostly footprints
Modern Haiku 56.1
secretly
on the subway car
my farts
(after issa and pound)
a leaf
captured in stone
subway mosaic
murky puddle
pigeons washing
the city on
thanksgiving parade
under the umbrella
just one jazz hand
fourth floor walkup
the smell of thanksgiving
on each landing
Zumwalt Acres (farm)
garden vole
hawk wings teeter
in the air
a duct tape cross
mending the greenhouse
easter lilies
tsuri-dōrō 28
peace of mind
a yoga studio and gunshop
side by side
crop rotation
I toss my nephew
the combine keys
Mayfly 79
Lorraine A Padden
lane markers
another haiku
crosses the line
cold moon 7/30/2021
out of body experience
the long drive
out of Texas
tsuri-dōrō 6, 2021
buds open willingly or not senior prom
FreshOut 4/30/24
loose tea
Sunday morning
without a sermon
Kingfisher 6, 2022
white daffodils
near a pedophile’s grave
daughter bulbs
tsuri-dōrō 5, 2021
RBG
the outspoken pattern
of a lace collar
brass bell March 2022
bonsai
the hips on a jack pine
shaped into service
Upwelling 2022
exposed bedrock
the all-white jury
acquits
Honorable Mention, Bloodroot Haiku Award 2022
chimneys
long shadows
over Dachau
Bottle Rockets 42, 2019
a shim
under the table leg
his stories about the war
Modern Haiku 55.3, 2024
ten o’clock curfew
ending the protest
hunger moon
Frogpond 43.3, 2020
line at the food bank
the distance
between meals
The Haiku Foundation Haiku Dialogue 2021
purple bloom
of a new moon
cheek bone
Time Haiku 57, 2023
red lights
a hierarchy
of needs
Kingfisher 3, 2021
misty night
on her usual corner
halo effect
tsuri-dōrō 15, 2023
every fifth of gin
how often
it never happened
Kingfisher 7, 2023
border crossing
the gaps between
prayer flags
Blithe Spirit 34.2, 2024
company weigh-in the off-white swan
Kingfisher 8, 2023
deep lake
his singular ashes at the bottom
of the food chain
Mariposa 50, 2024
local dialect
how easily she slips into
subservience
#FemkuMag 38, 2025
against the current
she teaches her daughter
about salmon
tsuri-dōrō 13, 2023
last scarecrow standing filibuster
tsuri-dōrō 27, 2025
unbless some
It’s the early service and the cross on top of the mega church casts a long shadow over the cars assembled in the parking lot. By day’s end the lot’s empty and shorter silhouettes creep onto the edges of the pavement; the tents are gone at first light. Parishioners complain about trash left on the property, so church leaders vote to surround the sanctuary with a fence and coded gate.
manicured lawn
the persistent threat
of a weed wacker
*title borrowed from Shakespeare Sonnet III
Blithe Spirit 32.4, 2022
Permission
because she couldn’t say
a rogue stray begs for food
because she couldn’t
a chrysalis hangs in the upside down
because she
another slammed door
because
wombs are wordless
Pan Haiku Review 3, 2024
Nicky Gutierrez
pilgrim’s road
the mist
trails ahead
Wales Haiku Journal Autumn 2023
original face the apple in the tree
outstretched hand
sunlight through
the communion wafer
chewing on God
my mouth
empty of bread
Prune Juice 37
finding my place
of resurrection—
a cardinal song
Frogpond 47.3
In the Beginning Love Story: a Haiku Sonnet
divine language—
the rock
comes to be
clothed
in flesh—
felix culpa
kotodama
the lamb
split in half
word made flesh
cry
of a newborn
rising sun
over the valley
firefly garden
the memorial stones
weathered away
Seashores 8 (April 2022)
Passion Sunday
how many times
have you said no?
Presence 78
vesper sparrow
never staying
past the first prayer
Presence 80
Rowan Beckett Minor
summer solstice
morning sickness
all day long
Autumn Moon 8.2
the tissue
my body fails to pass
unripe plum
tsuri-dōrō 27
still born inside the after-black an ounce of moon
2023 Trailblazer Contest: Haiku, Winner
hell-flower
the ghost of you
still in my hollow
tsuri-dōrō 21
sun in the west
I meet my baby
in the sky
Poetry Pea 2.25
karaoke bar—
the whiteness of my
Baby Got Back
Failed Haiku 68
honky-tonk
I wear my favorite
goth boots
Failed Haiku 68
cast party—
the Magician’s tricks
to get me in bed
Hot Girl Haiku (2021, Cuttlefish Books)
the last to know
who I went home with
white girl wasted
Hot Girl Haiku (2021, Cuttlefish Books)
day moon—
my one night stand
pretends not to know me
Hot Girl Haiku (2021, Cuttlefish Books)
Vandana Parashar
flushed cheeks
what am I
to a butterfly
Lexington Haiku Contest, July 2022
squid
ah! to have three hearts
broken
tsuri-dōrō 12 (Nov/Dec 2022)
honeymoon
all night long the sound
of melting snow
Modern Haiku 53.2 (June 2022)
library book
did his hands touch
you too
Prune Juice 36 (March 2022)
hash brownies
somewhere out there
a call’s loon
Prune Juice 44; Touchstone Awards Longlist, 2024
two decades on
the frog I kissed
still a frog
Prune Juice 45 (April 2025)
back from a funeral
scrubbing dead cells
off my face
haikuKATHA 36 (Oct 2024)
blackening
even his grave
wind from the mine
#FemkuMag 37 (Oct 2024)
witching hour
I find my mother-in-law
with a broom
tsuri-dōrō 23 (Sept/Oct 2024)
Truth or Dare
cold rain
after a while
it doesn’t matter
Most of the time, I’m extremely emotional and sensitive. I feel too hard, I fall too hard and I break too easily. But, there are times when I realise that I can be extremely cold, if I decide to. I haven’t yet explored those parts of me or given myself a chance to. But I know there’s a hidden switch in me. Someday, I might stumble upon it in the dark. Turn it on.
breaking the shell I decide to be
Contemporary Haibun Online 21.1 (April 2025)
trying to buy
few minutes of peace
from my kids . . .
for everything else
there is mastercard
TSA, 7 poems in 7 days (April 2020)
falling apart
stitch by stitch
I sit by the window
and sew a patch
on the quilt
Ribbons (Winter 2022)
Leap of Faith
Too embarrased to look me in the eye, he stares at his hands and says, "I am so, so sorry."
What am I supposed to do?
Should I shout and cry and feel less of a woman because he cheated on me?
Should I feel grateful that "it was only one time", as he says?
Or should I be relieved that he himself told me about it, appreciate his honesty and take it as a sign that he values me?
signalling storm
the sky turns fiery red . . .
I watch
as the house of cards
comes tumbling down
Thank you for reading. As explained above, we hope for this event to be participatory and engaging, and we invite your participation in these ways:
- Submit a response to the work of a poet Fellow for publication in the next issue.
- Respond live to a poet during the event.
- Read your work during the open mic.
To participate in these ways, please visit the submission and sign-up page.
We will email our subscribers the link to join before the event. If you’re not yet a subscriber, join us for free on our website.
If you have comments or questions about the event, hit the "comment" button below, or reach out to us at editor@confluencehaiku.com.
Member discussion