Kindness

We have lovely next-door neighbours, who are elderly and have suffered ill health, but they are always there for us. Soon after we moved in seventeen years ago, they invited us to a birthday party. When we go away, they have a key in case of emergencies. If I arrive home and they happen to be in their front garden, they wave, call out a friendly hello or stop for a chat.

When our cat Tosca died, they posted a card through the door, and did the same thing when I gave them a copy of an anthology containing one of my poems. They are keen gardeners and leave bags of beans and other vegetables by the back door. They are also ardent Norwich City football fans and my husband brings them back a programme whenever he commentates at a home match, for which they are always grateful.

harvest is over
flowers and vegetables
garden enrichment

Kim M. Russell, 2017

Image result for runner bean plants Pinterest
Image found on Pinterest – there’s nothing to photograph at the moment!

My response to dVerse Poets Pub Haibun Monday: Kindness

Today Toni is our host and would like us to write about kindness. She says we all could do with some kindness in this harsh world and has given us a couple of quotations as inspiration:

“Whoever you are, I have always depended on the kindness of strangers.” Blanche Dubois in A Streetcar Named Desire.

Winnie the Pooh:  “A little consideration, a little thought for others makes all the difference.”

She has also given us a personal anecdote.

What Toni would like us to do, in haibun format (tight paragraphs with a haiku at the end) in no more than 150 words, is write about actual kindness that was done for us or that we did for someone. She wants us to flood the universe with instances of kindness – and she’ll even forgive us if the haiku does not have seasonal word in it!

31 thoughts on “Kindness”

  1. Its very cool that you have that kind of relationship with your neighbors. Unfortunately not always the case. Neighbors to the left of us — most def. I cut his grass for a year when he broke his back. He gave me his tractor when he got a new one. When a tree fell on their house, I brought them coffee and allowed them use of our house until they got back on their feet and got it repaired. They will be there for us when we need them if they can be, as we will with them. This is community — not putting yourself above others but on equal field of need and giving.

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  5. I live in a small town, and am lucky enough to have great neighbors.We have a Neighborhood Watch, feed each other’s pets when it’s vacation. One of them borrows something, from tool to DVD, and keeps it forever. After one year, I remind him, but still it’s an irritant.

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  13. I apologize for getting to your submission so late. I lost internet (!) yesterday during the prompt and just got it back sometime early this morning. How wonderful it is to give and to receive. It reminds me how neighbors used to be when I was a kid/teen. I try to be neighborly and share things out of my garden. If no one reciprocates, it’s fine because the gesture didn’t go to waste. It is sad to think of losing them though. But…. the haiku at the end is beautiful and expresses so very much.

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    1. Thank you, Toni! I had problems with the internet this morning too. It puts you back, doesn’t it? Hope you are otherwise in fine fettle and I’ll see you on the Halloween poem trail in a couple of hours. 😱

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