Carpe Diem #108, Birdsong

Dear haijin, visitors and travelers,

Here in The Netherlands our very cold and snowy period of Winter is over. After a day of rain all the snow has gone. Temperatures are rising and it feels almost like Spring. Birds are singing their songs and that gives me a lot of joy and the feeling of a warm Spring day.

Today we share haiku on th prompt 'birdsong'. And I have found a nice 'You Tube video' with wonderful 'sounds of Spring'. I love to share that video here for your inspiration.

What a lovely video don't you think? Those sweet songs of birds ... so relaxing ... so close to nature ... resonating with your soul. Awesome.

I found a wonderful haiku on 'bird song' written by Kobayashi Issa, one of the four greatest haiku masters:

sasa naki mo temochi-busata no kakine kana

bird song in bamboo grass--
too shy
for the fence

Sasa naki ("birdsong in bamboo grass") has a special meaning in Japanese: "In winter, the birdsong, especially that of a warbler, is not fully developed due to the low sex-drive. The fragmented birdsong in winter is called sasa-naki and has nothing to do with bamboo grass. Knowing this, Issa plays with the literal meaning of the word, sasa-naki, to juxtapose it to singing on the fence.

Or this one by Buson:

hatautsuya torisae nakanu yamakageni

Plowing the fields--
Even birds have no song
In the shadow of a mountain 

Birds singing what a joy to listen ... Let's go do some haiku composing on 'bird song'.

at dawn
on the thin line between night and day
a Nightingale's song

early Spring morning
birds rejoicing Mother Nature -
Ah! that sweet sound

And one with a bit of humor in it:

'shut up!' I scream
after a night without sleep -
birds singing their songs


Well ... I love to write haiku on this prompt 'bird song' and I hope you do too. I am looking forward to your haiku for today. have fun, be creative and inspired. Share your wonderfully composed haiku here on Carpe Diem.

This prompt will stay on 'till January 31th 11.59 AM (CET) and I will post our last episode of Carpe Diem for this month later on today around 10.00 PM (CET) and that will be instead of 'cherry blossom' (as mentioned in our prompt list for January) 'early blossom', because cherry blossoms are more for March in which I will share all classical Japanese kigo (seasonswords) for Spring.