Sunday, March 27, 2016

Weekly Romanian Kukai no. 436




First Place – Petru-Ioan Gârda


cherry trees in bloom –
in the house grandma
putting out more lights


Second Place – Vasile Conioşi-Mesteşanu


April frost -
grandma’s kerchief over
a few branches


Third Place –Cezar Ciobîcă


train station in ruins -
a new born lamb
on the dead line




Third Place – Valeria Tamaş




searching in vain
for the tree of my childhood -
stumps everywhere...



Mention – Ion Cuzuioc


doves at the window –
getting yellow in the sunlight
the pile of letters



Mention – Magda Vlad


hidden moon –
white petals scattered on the ground
showing the way



Mention – Dan Norea



white in the mirror -
but where are the snows
of yesteryear?


Mention – Ana Drobot



lightly tapping the rhythm –
opening up slowly
the magnolias


Mention – Ioana Bud



the girl’s tresses
smelling of lilies of the valley -
first date



Wednesday, March 23, 2016

Comment for a winning haiku in Romanian Monthly Kukai March 2016



stall in the market –
over yesterday’s news
piles of nettles

Daniela Lăcrămioara Capotă

Right from the first reading, this poem caught my eyes. And it bit me. The nettle could not do otherwise. Especially when it is caught in the mood of the local environment. Through an expressive touch: the stall in the market place. Coming proudly into the foreground. 

The newsprint, for the poem speaks about it even if it does not name it, has always had a universal use in the countryside: as wrapping paper, as an improvisation for a tablecloth, to put in the home’s window to stop the bleaching light of the sun and even as an avant la lettre replacement of toilet paper. The pragmatic benefit of the support has far exceeded the need and respect for everyday information.

With some piety and with a strange national pride, you can see in the nettles, the true, native, specific virtues of the place. Slightly undermined by the miser-like air of the spring herbs  advanced to the rank of early vegetables (which obviously refresh the blood). G. Valer Pop, offering each time a multimedia presentation for the winning poems of Romanian Monthly Kukai, chose a brilliant photo for this poem.



The faces of the three women, although they have a very different expression, are a perfect comment for the poem. No, the news were not obsolete, but the realities are more eloquent this way - without words.


The poem has inside it a sarcasm that certainly, by biting us, refreshes our anemic blood due to much too flabby news. And you exclaim: Aha! No way, this is it!

(Corneliu Traian Atanasiu)

Romanian Monthly Kukai - March 2016



Special Prize


lady’s slipper
clinging to a nettle like a leech -
out of the blue a thunder

Petruța Ionescu


Companions in the world of plants, a verbal performance, a bucolic idyll in a countryside landscape – all in one, masterfully interwoven. He sent a thunder and gathered them all together: the lady is head over heels after a nettle and clings to it like a leech. Mesaliance and gender freedom. (Corneliu Traian Atanasiu).




First Place



first nettles -
going by too fast
the honeymoon

Daniela Zglibuțiu


Second Place



reddened palms -
on the darkened kerchief
a handful of nettles

Doina Bogdan Wurm


Third Place


dead line -
only nettles still grow
among railways

Maria Tirenescu


stall in the market –
over yesterday’s news
piles of nettles

Daniela Lăcrămioara Capotă


Fourth Place


the fragrance of my native land
in one wooden spoon -
nettle broth

Mihaela Gheorghiu


Fifth Place



another kind of thrill -
my lover’s garden
full of nettles

Genovel Florentin Frățilă


empty yard –
only the nettles are again
near the old fence

Grigore Chitul


ancient fortress –
living among the ruins
only the nettles

Valer G. Pop


Sixth Place

picking nettles –
same colour
the gypsy woman’s eyes

Virginia Popescu



nettle soup -
in the old man’s eyes
a few stars

Ioana Bud

Monday, March 21, 2016

Weekly Romanian Kukai no. 435



First Place – Magda Vlad


lights off –
under the apricot trees in bloom
white nights


Second Place – Ana Urma


the weeping of the vineyard gathered
in a few bottles –
missing grandma


Third Place – Violeta Urdă


no rippling -
a stork holding in its beak
Basho’s frog


Third Place – Ana Urma


lights at the window – 
the sky is obstructed
by cherry blossoms


Mention – Ioana Bud


cloudy sky -
a branch of cherry plum tree
knocking in the window with its blossoms


Mention – Luminița Ignea


scattered clouds -
the baby swan
splits a wave


Mention – Rodica P. Calota


Communion –
the boss clenching his teeth
during Lent



Saturday, March 19, 2016

Romanian Weekly Kukai no. 434 - Comments

nest in the eaves -
the old lady watching more often
along the way

Magda Vlad


This is the way suggestion and slippage work in a good poem. Here we do not need an explicit kigo – spring is here and the nest in the eaves automatically enters its role awaiting the return of the birds. And everything skids: the longing and the expectations of the old woman fold over those of nature. Why would the outcasts in the world not return to the nest also?


white sheet -
a feather brought by the wind
sits down at the writing desk

Costin Iliescu


Why does the white field need to be full with black sheep? An excuse, a reason, a lyrical pulse that is suddenly there before us just like the feather brought up by the wind. A haiku moment where something moves in the soul to inspire the hand ready to start work.

shaking dust
off the doll in the old attic -
March wind

Violeta Urdă


The March wind - the impulse that sets the world into motion. It cleans up trees, tearing up the dead branches. It breathes life into the buds. It causes the water’s surface, hitherto placid, to curl. Why wouldn’t the forgotten doll in the attic wake up the childhood that can always be resurrected in our souls filled with the happiness of spring? 


coverage –
behind the casemate
snowdrops growing

Rodica P. Calotă


If I wait partiently and follow attentively the thoughts that the poem awakens in me, I understand that the meaning is most certainly a malicious one. The coverage, a military term menaing to defend, to protect the withdrawal or advance of the combatants, is derided and skids into the idea that snowdrops are hidden there, behind the bunker, which is useless now, in times of peace. There, laymen will not see it, only professional wanderers will notice and appreciate it.


organ concert -
through gutters and drainpipes
sound of rain

Costin Iliescu

To be in full concert what it takes is more than a mere assimilation of organ pipes with gutters and drainpipes? Rain is a genius organist and, although it always improvises on the same subject, it never repeats the same concert. You just need to listen to it patiently and ... with fervor.


casa natală -
doar un cais sprijinind
cerul plin de flori


birthplace -
only an apricot tree supporting
the sky full of flowers

Magda Vlad


The word only contradicts the first verse. The house, most likely, has disappeared. What we have left is only the spot where there was a house. But the place does not refute anything, it remains miraculous. And, as always, the apricot is an axis mundi. This is why, no doubt, every house is blessed.

Corneliu Traian Atanasiu


Sunday, March 13, 2016

Weekly Romanian Kukai no. 434


First Place – Magda Vlad

nest in the eaves -
the old lady watching more often
along the way

Second Place – Costin Iliescu

white sheet -
a feather brought by the wind
sits down at the writing desk

Third Place – Violeta Urdă

shaking dust
off the doll in the old attic -
March wind

Mention – Rodica P. Calotă

coverage –
behind the casemate
snowdrops growing

Mention – Costin Iliescu

organ concert -
through gutters and drainpipes
sound of rain

Mention – Magda Vlad

birthplace -
only an apricot tree supporting
the sky full of flowers