Upper Rubber Boot Books

Hiss of Leaves

11 August 2012

ISBN 978-1-937794-17-0 (epub). ISBN 978-1-937794-15-6 (mobi). ISBN 978-1-937794-16-3 (pdf). Out of print.

• Discuss this book at Goodreads and LibraryThing.

Explore the subtle beauty of beetles, trash in the wind, cigar boxes, snail trails, bottle caps, sheets snapping on the line, and more. This contemplative haiku chapbook by T. D. Ingram will help you cultivate a greater awareness of the magnificent in the everyday, and open your heart to the beauty inherent in everything.

From Hiss of Leaves:

silence
heat weights the air
then crickets

fall morning
monarchs fly
with the leaves

hiss of leaves
sheets snap
on the line

Poems from the book available online:

These links all open in a new window.

• five haiku at The Haiku Foundation, part of The Haiku Registry and included in THF Haiku App: “hiss of leaves” [originally Editors Choice, South by Southeast 11:1 (2004) and Tinywords (April 21, 2005)]; “last freight car” [originally South by Southeast 14:3 (2007)]; “fall morning” [originally South by Southeast 11:1 (2004)]; “hawk circles” [originally South by Southeast 10:1 (2003)]; “clear evening” [originally South by Southeast 12:2 (2005)].
• “the silence,” A Hundred Gourds 1:1 December 2011.
• “noonday heat,” Red Dragonfly, August 19, 2011.

Reviews:

These poems necessarily embrace the seasons and the natural world, but they also embrace the mundane world of humans. For instance, “bottle caps”:

bottle caps
stuck in blacktop
small planets

One my favorites, “the brightness”:

the brightness
of the full moon
deepens the cold

I have yet to experience the snow in the high desert of Oregon to see if this is true here also, but it is certainly true in the Midwest and other places I’ve been. It seems as if the light from the full moon, illuminating the world it shines on, ought make the winter night a little warmer but it has the exact opposite effect. The poet has caught this perfectly.

— Mark Lindner, “Ingram, Hiss of Leaves,” Habitually Probing Generalist, 26 September 2012.

Entry filed under: Poetry. Tags: Hiss of Leaves, T. D. Ingram.