One year of haiku,
All part of an assignment,
Promoting writing.
My thoughts are a mess,
No matter how hard I try,
My words aren't flowing.
Stop holding it in,
All emotions are human,
Men need talk and share.
_________
post note on title ...
(((ME)N)TAL)
ME
MEN
MENTAL
(((HE)AL)(TH))IS)
HE
HEAL
HEALTH
(TH))IS)
THIS
IS
OK
OK
Finally, birthday,
Retirement and holiday.
Celebrations end.
As I grow less young,
Years seem to fly by faster,
Then the one before.
Don't rush holidays,
Cherish a child's wonder,
As long as you can.
Christmas has arrived,
Never let your eyes fool you,
Why we celebrate.
Christmas gatherings,
Filled with love, sweets, gifting and
Making memories.

Shampooing is life,
Let tears flow, clean up the dirt,
Then start all over.

The reason I failed,
I always sought perfection,
They wanted my best.
Knowing my time's come,
To step down and move onward,
When no longer fun.

In my next chapter,
Reset, restart, refocus,
Will be my new goals.
Why is it so hard,
Saying bye to yesterday,
With tomorrow’s gift.
I’m hot and bothered,
Not because you pissed me off,
You downplayed my worth.
Today is the day,
I open a new chapter,
To a well lived life.
December fifteenth,
Nineteen hundred sixty-nine,
I made my presence.
A birthday's best gift,
Celebrate another year,
Being blessed with life.
From when I announced,
It was all too surreal,
Till it was real.
I leave tomorrow,
A bit better than today,
Greater than yesterday.

My journey here ends,
In my over forty years,
My legacy lives.
My heart and soul filled,
With plenty of happy tears,
Empty sad smiles.
Tomorrow’s not promised,
Leave yesterday as memories,
Today’s gift, the present.
This is not good-bye,
It's on my time and my terms,
See you later friends.
My pride is now filled,
My emotions are fragile,
My soul is shattered.
As I closed the door,
I came to a sudden stop,
When I became lost.
Nothings good enough,
When your the perfectionist,
Settle for your best.
My best gift to you,
Timeless, cheap, one size fits all,
Easy returns too!

Hurting emotions,
I wait to share my bad news,
With a dull dagger.

I can't wait until,
We can visit once again,
Or have a long chat.
Stay green, you're growing
When you turn red, you ripen,
In the end, you'll rot.
I stare at the clouds,
Dancing the mid-day's blue sky,
Transforming, like me.

By now, you should know,
His story, is my story,
Waiting to be shared.
Sing loud to be heard,
Dance like no one is watching,
To your life’s music.
For my blessed lived life,
I am thankful for each day,
Not just Thanksgiving.

Between all the years,
Its hard for me to believe,
My footprint remains.

Started as a job,
I am about to retire,
From a great career.

ABOUT ME, THE BLOGGER
Robert W Kovacs is a graduate with an Associate of Arts in Elementary Education from Broward (Community) College and graduated cum laude with a Bachelor of Public Administration and a Master of Science in Parks and Recreation Administration from Florida International University.
He recently retired after just over 40 years of service and his final position was the Payroll Administrator. He continues to astonish himself as mathematics just didn’t add up to anything exciting in his grade point average throughout both high school and college years. As long as he can remember his writing has always been a part of defining him.
The blog shares the form, syllable count and format of a traditional haiku but with a twist of themes being on life's observations and lessons learned as opposed to traditional haiku being based on a nature theme.
The author uses quick whips of daily events, humor and "a-ha" moments to capture his haiku.
Like his YMEJOURNEY blog, his writing brings you into his world as it offers him a catharsis, meandering through experiences of significant episodes of reflections of this ride on earth, that we call life.
Robert prides himself being an even-keel, grounded, educated and professional who appreciates simple pleasures in a complicated world. He enjoys more things than he doesn’t and welcomes being introduced to new adventures. In his spare time he enjoys traveling on vacations to see more of this world, a diverse genre of movies and TV, reading mostly biographies and fiction, listening to almost all genres of 80s music, board games/Wii, beach/pool, bicycling, parks, cooking and eating, relaxing and thought provoking conversations with quality time with genuine people. Presently, his primary coordinates are approximately 26.0523° N, 80.1439° W, on Spaceship Earth.
WHY HAIKU?
2024 Daily Challenge - Haiku!
I belong to a writing club and our facilitator (friend) gave us a challenge to take on 01.01.24.
I was challenged by this friend to use one style of writing and post every day a learned lesson of life or a positive affirmation every day of 2024. The writing style must remain the same for the duration of the challenge. All free form writing that is anything but narratives (poems, limericks, sonnets, etc) less than 1000 words must post daily while narratives exceeding 2500 words once a week. Anything in between at least 3 times a week. You must keep all grammatical, syntax, rhyming and syllable counts but can vary on themes and content.
I wimped out on the second part of the challenge as I picked Haiku as my writing style as it was simple.
A haiku is a Japanese poem of three lines consisting of 5, 7 and 5 syllables respectively. Typically, covering images of nature but I’ll take my spin on it for this challenge.
I like to write about my life’s observations, lessons learned and self affirmations as I try to find my way through a complicated world.
Eventually, they’ll make it to my blog but for now here’s my attempt at a haiku a day for 365 days enjoy my Nuts, Bolts and Everything Else.
Enjoy!
AUTHOR'S DISCLOSURE
An artist's purpose is to evoke emotion and/or dialogue of the masterpiece created, without either, it's no longer art, let alone a masterpiece.
This blog represents the author's original writing and makes no apology for posts resulting in experiencing a sense of discomfort when reading his own personal reflections, thoughts, affirmations, observations and opinions of his journey in finding his way through a complicated world, of his so called life. The author requests readers remain mindful of dates when a post was written. Many of the earlier posts were academic assignments with guidelines to uphold the integrity and standards of a specific writing style. One or a combination of formatting, rhyming schemes, syllable counts, themes and specific guidelines which were up to self-interpretation and self-discovery.
This set the tone for the author's tone and unique writing style. He requests readers remain open-minded to viewpoints differing from their own. The author strongly believes "we can disagree and still remain friends" and welcomes respectful dialogue and questioning of his writings. However; hateful disagreement our outright dismissal or suggesting the author's writings are inherently wrong will not be tolerated and may not be conducive to constructive conversation.
PHOTOGRAPH CREDITS
Photographs for YMeJourney are generally used from the blogger's personal photograph collection, downloaded from Unsplash.com or maybe created via AI tools.
Blogger's personal photograph collection are photos taken from author or photographs provided to him by family and/or friends.
Photographs taken from the Unsplash.com website state, the following in their terms of use: Unsplash grants irrevocable, nonexclusive, worldwide copyright license to download, copy, modify, distribute, perform, and use images from Unsplash for free, including for commercial purposes, without permission from or attributing the photographer or Unsplash.
The remainder of photographs or animated renderings are created by various AI apps and/or websites freely availalble on the internet with images created by them are free to use.