Easter Sunday Haiku

Easter Sunday

as the churchyard mist parts

another grave

NeverEnding Story, April 5, 2026

Added: 

What Will Come Next?

in Easter sunshine

a billboard atop the church

proclaims:

Mary, called Magdalene

host to seven devils

Jesus is Risen

drifts from the whitewashed church

on the corner

a middle-aged black man

wears a crown of thorns

FYI: White evangelical Protestants have emerged as one of the most loyal and crucial voting blocs for Donald Trump, with approximately 72% to 80% supporting him in the 2016, 2020, and 2024 elections... excerpted from Pew Research Center, Feb. 9, 2026: "White evangelicals remain among Trump’s strongest supporters,"

Easter Sun Haiku

each

drop

of

dew

Easter

sun

NeverEnding Story, March 31 2024

reprinted in Serbian Haiku Anthology edited by Dajan Bogojevic

Added: 

Easter sunshine

nun-bartenders  pull pints of beer

topped with God's word

(FYI: Reuters, March 26: "In Spain, nuns, [who run a bar, the House of the Mother, opening at 10 am, in the Sanctuary of Estibaliz outside the Basque city of Vitoria], quench pilgrims' thirst for beer and the word of God"

I think plenty of people would think it's unusual, because they've never seen it. But you know, it's not a sin to drink a beer  😂 ," said Miami-born Sister Guadalupe, adding that the bar constituted an "open door for us to evangelise")

Added: 

Unblessed

years after betrayal

I hid alone

in the last pews

at various megachurches ..

this sombre Good Friday 

Death seeks me out

like a green-eyed lover

but yet I live

this Easter Sunday 

in the broken world

FYI: A megachurch has been defined by Hartford Institute for Religion Research (2006) as any Christian church which at least 2,000 members attend in a worship service.

Easter Prayer Tanka

reading between the lives and writing between the lines, LXIII

clean-shaven

in a white cassock edged with lace

this old priest

offers the Easter Prayer  ...

a changed man screams in silence

NeverEnding Story, April 10 2023

FYI: The main theme of various Easter Prayers offered by the denominations of Christianity is about this joyous time of year that brings peace and hope to the followers of "Jesus/the Risen Lord."

For example,

We praise you in this Easter season. Change our lives, change our hearts to be messengers of Easter joy and hope. We make our prayer through Jesus Christ, our risen Lord forever. Amen.

And this tanka is a sequel to the following one written for a residential school survivor

alone, she stares 

through a half-open door ...

the EXIT sign

lights the priest's face

and a naked boy, bent over

PoemHunter, July 6 2021 

Added: reading between the lives and writing between the lines, LXIV

the priest raises God

in his trembling fingers ...

this God as light

as a wafer on my tongue, yet

as heavy as a rock on my heart

FYI: This tanka is a prequel to my tanka below:

unshackled 

from my childhood beliefs

I'm a passing thought

in the mind of God

who forsook his son on the cross

Bulgarian and English Tanka Handbook (edited by Dimitar Anakiev), 2022

Added: No More Fairy Tales, XII

5000-mile-wide

blob of seaweed on the move

dark, darker stratus clouds

FYI: CNN News, March 16 2023: A 5,000-mile-wide blob of seaweed is headed for Florida, threatening tourism across the Caribbean

The Great Atlantic Sargassum Belt, a 5,000-mile-long belt of seaweed weighing more than 11 million tons, is threatening to wreak havoc in the coastal waters and beaches of the Atlantic Ocean. It's so big that it can be seen from space, spanning the tropical Atlantic from West Africa to the Caribbean.

Added:

alone and sandwiched

between Trump fans and foes

reunion buffet

Orthodox Easter of War

leaf buds

tremble at the edge

of a twig ...

the look in a girl's eyes

at the Polish border 

on Kyiv's street corner

a combat-suited man sings 

Oh, Red Kalyna ...

a boy pointing his stick

trills along in morning chill

five thousand

blue-and-yellow Easter eggs

hung in Lviv's 

Corridor of Life ...

a distant roll of thunder

NeverEnding Story, April 23 2022

FYI: The red kalyna is a berry that symbolizes Ukrainian culture rich in dance, music, and folk tales. "Oh, Red Kalyna In the Meadow" was written during the First World War to honour Ukrainian riflemen. And most Ukrainians are Orthodox Christians and celebrate Easter on April 24.

Added:

alone and lost

in the fog of dementia

a veteran

turns on the TV daily

for news of the Ukraine War

FYI; People, April 21: Some Older Ukrainians with Dementia Are Experiencing Russia's War Anew Every Day

Olga Boichak, a sociologist, is based in Australia but speaks with her grandparents each day. "She's going through the daily trauma of rediscovering that war has begun, and keeps trying to evacuate," she told the Times.

Boichak wrote about the situation on Twitter, sharing how her grandmother has been in a "never-ending loop for 41 days straight."

Easter Truce Haiku

written in response to Vatican News, April 10: Pope‘s call for "Easter truce" a time to stop and look to Christ: “ Let the weapons be silenced. Let the Easter truce begin... Nothing is impossible for God "

day before yesterday

day after today ...

more bomb craters

NeverEnding Story, April 17 2022

Added: written in response to The Washington Post, April 17: Pope calls for peace in Ukraine on ‘Easter of war,’ warns of nuclear threat

a basket of pysanky

the wingbeats of a dove

in smoking twilight

FYI: A pysanka (plural: pysanky) is a Ukrainian Easter egg, decorated using beeswax and dyes. The word comes from the verb pysaty, “to write”, as the designs are not painted on, but written with beeswax.

Added: Three Hundred and Thirty-Third Entry,  Coronavirus Poetry Diary

vaccine campaign

our differences enveloped

in snowflakes 

Selected Senryu: Bedroom Noises Senryu

Easter morning
a boy mimics Mom and Dad's
bedroom noises

Haiku Canada Review, 6:2, October 2012

Selected Tanka: Group Home Tanka

her pale face
and a ragged Barbie's ...
framed by the window
of a group home
in Easter sunlight 

PoemHunter, April 15, 2012

Two I's Tanka

time over time
I-then and I-now
face to face
with each other ...
my first Easter Sunday

Atlas Poetica, 19, 2014

Relics Tanka

on Easter Night
relics of my past
resurrected --
the drip drip of the faucet
into this dark silence

Ribbons, 10:2, Spring 2014

Calliope/My Ex: Love/Trouble Maker, VIII

the chill air
this Easter morning ...
Miss Lee,
my ex and the muse
morph into one

Atlas Poetica, #18, 2014

Muse Tanka

the muse and I
live together for years
like two workers
who bunk in the same room ...
snow flurries after Easter

Cattails, 2, May 2014

The Inconvenient Indian, A Haibun

for Thomas King

Three limo-loads of corporate lawyers and accountants are heading to the airport... a Haida elder stands at the ocean's edge with the cedars at his back and the azure sky on his shoulders.

Easter morning
First Nations youth  dance and chant
Idle No More...

NeverEnding Story, April 1, 2013

Note: "Idle No More" is an ongoing protest movement originating among the Aboriginal/First Nations peoples in Canada.

Easter Sunlight Haiku

Easter sunlight
streaming through the window
her breath on my neck

Asahi Haikuist Network, March 29, 2013

Confessions Haiku

confessions graffitied
on the wall of a white church
Easter sunlight

Haiku of Merit, (Shintai), World Haiku Review, March 2013

A Haiku about Her Breath

Easter sunlight
streaming through the window
her breath on my neck

PoemHunter Feb. 19 2013

Love Letters Tanka

love letters
I never sent her…
one by one
they morph into lilies
this Easter morning

AHA: The Anthology

Widower Haiku

Easter morning
the whiskey breath
of a widower

PoemHunter (July 26, 2012)

Beauty Clinic Tanka

giant red lips
perched on a billboard
high atop
a beauty clinic...
this cold Easter Sunday

Notes from the Gean, 4:1, June 2012

Easter Senryu

Easter morning:
sunlight reflected
from the wine glass

Japanese Translation by Hidenori Hiruta

復活祭の朝
日光が反射している
ワイングラスから

Akita International Haiku Network