Yosa and the Crows: Three Golden Shovel Poems After Yosa Buson, by Janet Ruth

Two Crows in Winter, by Yosa Buson (Japan) before 1784

Feathers and Falling
 
they end their flight
one by one--
crows at dusk
                        Buson
 
Hunched against snow and cold, they
ruffle ebony feathers against the end
of day, flakes sift down, slide from their
backs—a flurry of brightness in flight
 
from growing dark. Huddled together, one
shifts her feet on snowy branch, close by
her mate. Looking over his shoulder, one
 
croaks into the silent storm. Two Crows
in Winter peer out from scant shelter at
a glitter of falling stars at dusk.
 

Three Crows in Snow, by Yosa Buson (Japan) before 1784

​Wild Dissonance

This poem is a Golden Shovel after Three Crows on a Pine Bough, by Yosa Buson (Japan) before 1784. The poet was inspired by the image inside a copy of Robert Hass' The Essential Haiku. The artwork above is by the same artist, but is not the same  one that inspired this poem.
 
Out of a gray winter sky full of wind, three
black-feathered forms, then a thousand crows,
wild and cawing from a day in the fields, descend on
the bosque to roost. A dark rustle of feathers and a
dissonance of voices. Someone nearby chops piñon pine
logs for a fire, shakes pine cones from a severed bough.

Kite and Two Crows, by Yosa Buson (Japan) before 1784

Yesterday
 
a kite
in the same place
in yesterday’s sky
                     Buson
 
On the twisted branch of a wind-blown willow, a
strange trio of birds hunch against weather. The kite
 
settles its feathers. The crows perched solemnly in
the mist, stare into the distance, suspend the
natural urge to harass a foe. The same wind, the same
spatter strikes each of them. Meager shelter in this place
 
they have chosen—a Kite and Two Crows in 
the rain. There is just the moment. Yesterday’s
flight—no consequence—memories of a high blue sky.

Janet Ruth
​
Janet Ruth is a New Mexico ornithologist and poet whose writing focuses on connections to the natural world.  She has recent poems in Tiny Seed Literary Journal, Unlost, Wales Haiku Journal, and multiple anthologies.  She has recently been writing haiku and golden shovels from the poems of haiku masters. Being a fan of corvids, she was particularly captured by the art and haiku of Yosa Buson that refers to crows. Her first book, Feathered Dreams: celebrating birds in poems, stories & images (Mercury HeartLink, 2018) was a Finalist for the 2018 NM/AZ Book Awards.   https://redstartsandravens.com/janets-poetry/