Summer’s first small joy:
 
finding a speckled feather
 
on my patio.

 
 
 

Little brown sparrow,
 
I have no use this morning
 
for your songs of joy.

 

 
 
 

Slug on the sidewalk,
 
do you portend great sorrows
 
or unbounded joy?

 
 
 

First small joy of spring—
 
a young boy at the bike store
 
gets a bargain price.

 
 
 

From a sparrow’s throat
 
songs of joy spill on a branch—
 
autumn afternoon.

 
 
 

With a shriek of joy,
 
a hawk greets the morning sun
 
and begins to hunt.

Joy

 
 
 

Night of the first snow—
 
if the world ended right now,
 
my joy would be full.

Tidings

 
 
 

Tidings of great joy
 
peal out from a weathered bell—
 
a baby is born!

Welcoming

 
 
 

Welcoming April—
 
even the monk in his cell
 
seems giddy with joy.

Joy

 
 
 

only one small joy
 
on the first day of sixth month—
 
yellow butterfly