writeALONG 16 June 2026

A TUESDAY FEATURE

hosts: Padma Rajeswari, K. Ramesh

guest editor: Sathya Venkatesh

Only the unpublished poems (that are never published on any social media platform/journals/anthologies) posted here for each prompt will be considered for Triveni Haikai India's monthly journal -- haikuKATHA, each month.

Poets are requested to post poems (haiku/senryu) that adhere to the prompts/exercises given.

Only 1 poem to be posted in 24 hours. Total 2 poems per poet are allowed each week (numbered 1,2). So, revise your poems till 'words obey your call'.

Responses are usually a mixture of grain and chaff. The poet has to be discerning about what to take for the final version of the poem or the unedited version will be picked up for the journal.

The final version should be on top of the original version for selection.

Poetry is a serious business. Give you best attempt to feature in haikuKATHA !!

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We have rocks and mountains and seas and stars and rivers and deserts and fossils of old animals. These and other like things are our books for the earth’s early story. And the real way to understand this story is not merely to read about it in other people’s books but to go to the great Book of Nature itself.

You will I hope soon begin to learn how to read this story from the rocks and mountains. Imagine how fascinating it is! Every little stone that you see lying in the road or on the mountain side may be a little page in nature’s book and may be able to tell you something if you only knew how to read it. To be able to read any language, Hindi or Urdu or English, you have to learn its alphabet. If you see a little round shiny pebble, does it not tell you something? How did it get round and smooth and shiny without any corners or rough edges?

If you break a big rock into small bits, each bit is rough and has corners and rough edges. It is not at all like a round smooth pebble. How then did the pebble become so round and smooth and shiny? It will tell you its story if you have good eyes to see and ears to hear it. It tells you that once upon a time, it may be long ago, it was a bit of a rock, just like the bit you may break from a big rock or stone with plenty of edges and corners. Probably it rested on some mountain side. Then came the rain and washed it down to the little valley where it found a mountain stream which pushed it on and on till it reached a little river. And the little river took it to the big river. And all the while it rolled at the bottom of the river and its edges were worn away and its rough surface made smooth and shiny. So it became the pebble that you see.

Somehow the river left it behind and you found it. If the river had carried it on, it would have become smaller and smaller till at last it became a grain of sand and joined its brothers at the seaside to make a beautiful beach where little children can play and make castles out of the sand. If a little pebble can tell you so much, how much more could we learn from all the rocks and mountains and the many other things we see around us?

Source:

Jawaharlal Nehru’s letters to his daughter Indira Gandhi, collected in the book Letters from a Father to His Daughter (written in 1928).

Use this as an inspiration to craft your poems.