wet riverbank
wet riverbank
the path I've walked
is nowhere there
Notes This is another photo outside of the village of Ban Xanghai, Laos, about 2 hours by motorboat upstream on the Mekong from Luang Prabang. This was taken in July, at the beginning of the monsoon season, so the Mekong is still very much receded, revealing wide wet banks that stretch along mile after mile. The villages take advantage of this time of year to plant crops along the bank where the soil is nutrient rich and where it rains nearly everyday during the monsoon season. Eventually, the river will reclaim all the banks and rise up into the village itself. Then the dry season comes and the river slowly recedes again.
As for the haiku, I'm trying to capture something specific about walking along a wet riverbank, but I won't say what as that is what the haiku should be doing. If it does not, for you, well, can't win 'em all.