THF Monthly Kukai — December 2025

 
 
Welcome to the THF Monthly Kukai.

This month’s theme:
bag
 
 
 
Note: Anonymity is an essential part of any kukai. Please respect this to offer the reader (and voter) the opportunity to choose only the poem.

The THF Kukai Overview

A kukai is a (usually quite casual) poetry contest. The administrator of the kukai (that’s us) assigns a theme for a given writing period and posts to Troutswirl (The Haiku Foundation blog) on the THF site, which is then redirected outward through our various media outlets. Poets write work to this theme during the allotted time and submit it to the administrator. The work submitted is gathered into an anonymous roster and posted to Troutswirl (The Haiku Foundation blog) for public viewing. At that time all participating poets and other interested readers may vote for their favorites. Votes are tallied and the results made public. The top winners will be acknowledged each month, and offered their choice of prizes from a list compiled by the Foundation. Please remember that everyone who votes is a winner — the process of choosing your personal favorites is not just fun, but also one of the best ways to improve your own haiku practice!

Results of Last Month’s THF Kukai

theme: brown

In November there were 187 submissions from thirty-one countries across six continents.
One hundred sixteen voters casting ballots determined the following results.

First Prize
 
a butterfly
in the amber . . .
child bride
     — Bill Fay (63 points - 9; 2; 1; 2; 3)
 
Here we see an opening image of fragile beauty preserved in something hard, immutable. Is a child bride like a butterfly in amber — caught in a moment in time, trapped, never to escape? Child marriage is recognized as a violation of human rights, but it continues today. With that final line, this haiku asks us to reflect deeply on the implications. A powerful haiku.
 
Second Prize
 
job interview —
he folds his hope
in a brown envelope
     — Jagajit Salam (57 points - 3; 6; 2; 5; 2)
 
A brown envelope is such an unassuming image, but often official communication is conveyed in brown envelopes, and the mere sight of one can be stressful. Here, I get the sense it holds much more than news about a job. It is the future that the job represents. The sound qualities are very effective — the echo of the long o’s in “holds,” “hope,” and “envelope.” An understated and poignant haiku.
 
 
Honorable Mentions
 
root beer float
my troubles rise
to the surface
     — thomas david
 
Ah, this haiku brought me back to childhood! A root beer float gets its name from the scoop of vanilla ice cream that bobs around on top. Seen in that light, those troubles seem much less worrisome!
 
autumn signs
on mom's hands
age spots
     — Mirela Brailean
 
Just as autumn signals a transition toward winter, it can express a gradual decline in humans as well as nature. In this haiku, those small dark spots that arrive unbidden herald autumn in a woman’s life.
 
sharpening
the brown crayon —
autumn woods
     — Lori Kiefer
 
Brown is sometimes thought of as dull, but this haiku — with that first well-chosen word — suggests complexity and depth. It calls to mind the physical act of sharpening a crayon, but it also hones our sense of the many browns in autumn woods.
 
colorblind
she paints the sunset
brown
     — Neha Singh Soni
 
Artists can surprise us with other ways of seeing, revealing different perspectives on the world. Here, the artist shows us that end of day is not always showy, with loud oranges and reds — it can be more muted, subdued.
 
merging into each other
a brown owl
and its hollow
     — Vaishnavi Ramaswamy
 
An owl’s winter browns provide very effective camouflage, and its mottled colors blend into tree trunks and hollows. So effectively sometimes we’re not quite sure if that rustling brown is the slight movement of a feather, or the play of light against shadow.

Beverly Acuff Momoi is THF Monthly Kukai Commentator. She is an award-winning poet and author of how the wind sighs and Lifting the Towhee’s Song. From 2019 to 2021 Beverly served as a panelist for the Touchstone Distinguished Book Awards.

Writing for The Haiku Foundation Monthly Kukai

On the first day of each month The Haiku Foundation will announce the kukai theme for that month. This theme should be the topic of your poem, and may be stated (by using the theme word or words) or implied. Form may be traditional (three-line, 5-7-5) or free (various numbers of lines and/or syllables). Season words (kigo) may or may not be used at the poet’s discretion. A poet may submit one poem per theme. All poems must be the original, unpublished work of the author. In order to maintain the spirit and fairness of the kukai, a poem that has appeared anywhere with its author’s name cannot be allowed for submission.

Please use the Kukai submission form below to enter your poem, and then press Submit to send your entry. No other submissions will be recognized or honored. Once a poem is submitted it cannot be revised. All poems must be signed (that is, no “anonymous” poems will be accepted, and the Submit button will not be available until both Name, Email, and Place of Residence fields are filled in). Poets will not receive acknowledgment of their submissions. Poems will be accepted from the announcement of the theme through midnight of the 15th of that month. All poets are eligible to participate. Administrators of the kukai are ineligible to submit poems. Your submission form to us should look something like this:

line one
followed by line two
and then line three

or

this poem is all in one line

or

            jjjjjjjjjjj
kkkkkkkkkk
                    lll
   mmmmm

[all lines right-justified]

If your poem has special formatting requirements you should note them as in the third example above.

Good luck, and have fun!