Cover art by Hunter Armstrong

Chen-ou Liu's Blurb on the back cover.

“The short poems presented in Journeys: Getting Lost are beautifully crafted with haiku/tanka sensitivities. These are poems of mountains, rivers, clouds, grassy fields, deserts and highways that take readers on a series of journeys across the gendered, rural, urban, and spiritual spaces. In the poems, Carole Johnston shows a flair for tying emotions to arresting images and invites readers to become a fellow  traveler.”

time traveler                                         
on the road with Basho
watching stars spin
fireflies disappearing
I fill my brush with ink

“The thematic motifs explored in Journeys: Getting Lost remind me of the opening passage of Basho’s The Narrow Road to the Deep North, which is considered one of the most famous travelogues ever:

The moon and sun are eternal travelers. Even the years wander on. A lifetime adrift in a boat, or in old age leading a tired horse into the years, every day is a journey, and the journey itself is home. From the earliest times there have always been some who perished along the road. Still I have always been drawn by wind-blown clouds into dreams of a lifetime of wandering…”

Chen-ou Liu is the author of Ripples from a Splash:A Collection of Haiku Essays with Award-Winning Haiku, Following the Moon to the Maple Land (First Prize Winner of the 2001 Haiku Pix Chapbook Contest),Broken/Breaking English: Selected Short Poems and Politics/Poetics of Re-Homing.