Alan Summers
Gormfhlaith
Before the High Heat of the morning, a humble visit to pay tribute. Both rescued lurcher dogs and close family enter the fabled grove at the place where paddocks end and legends shimmer.
Forgoing words and other speech we hear the sizzling and buzzing of non-bird type wings.
a walk through
the bluebell forest
seeking fairy lore
what are ripples in humans
and a distant bell calling
About the Author
Alan Summers is founder of the Call of the Page website, featuring one-on-one mentoring sessions and online courses, and The Pan Haiku Review. A previous editor of the British Haiku Society’s Blithe Spirit (2018) and the Red Moon anthologies (2000–2005), he had a winning haibun in the Bournemouth Writing Festival Poetry & Flash Fiction 2024 anthology, Lines in the Sand.
Hello Alan,
This imagery is beautiful, and my favorite is ” …the place where paddocks end and legends shimmer” immersing yourself– becoming the shimmer, the legend in the bluebell forest, hearing a single bell calling to you with the presentation of the two questions to solve. Perhaps one could say, a call of the page. Perhaps a dream-like quality is what I felt in the sensation of this prose. I loved that those dogs were the guardians with you and your family. In such few words you have managed to change time, place and space really, seamlessly. One other note I did not know, is a toad or a frog is referred to as a paddock, mainly a frog. Fascinating!! You have quite the story working here ! All the Best, Karina
Many thanks Karina!
The tanka-bun is a combination of autobiography (my brother-in-law has a converted barn and a number of fields, and there’s a forest that backs onto the main field), and Irish and faerie legend, and that Summer in-between dream, such as Alice in Wonderland perhaps.
There was a mysterious incident in the actual forest that acted as the catalyst, that only myself, my brother-in-law, and perhaps one of the lurcher dogs sensed and “quarter-saw”. It was definitely a call of the page and call to the page!
Regarding PADDOCK
I brought in an Aussie term, from my years living in Queensland, drawing upon the legends that permeate the land in pre-European times.
It’s both the Australian and New Zealand equivalent of the word “field” as used in other English-speaking regions.
There is always another reality running alongside our own perceived daily world.
warmest regards,
Alan