SHADOW PLAY: Night Haiku

by Penny Hatter ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 1, 1994

Harter (Stages and Views, not reviewed) evokes nighttime in a series of haiku poems that capture its sounds, shadows, and muted colors. As a child falls asleep, he remembers (imagines? dreams?) of nighttime excursions, lunar eclipses, shooting stars, the Milky Way. On a country road ""all the stars pour through/the car radio... by the roadside/one cow lifts her face/into our headlights."" At a circus, a fortuneteller ""traces the line in my palm to a star."" And on a moonless night there are ""as many crickets singing/as the stars."" Drawn in off-color hues that bring to mind the forest greens and maroons of 1940s cars and styles, Greene's rich pastel-work brings Harter's modern haiku back to another time, and another childhood. The night is alive with movement, and with light, in this stunning book.

Pub Date: Sept. 1, 1994

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: 32

Publisher: S&S

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1994

Categories: POETRY