Poetry Challenge 2026

I was invited by some poets in Japan to join an online project where we write a poem every day. A theme is assigned for everyone for each day. Today’s was “reset.” I decided to write my first poem of 2026 as haiku. And so here goes:

HAIKU FOR RESET

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 1, 2026

Pain loss empty love

Every day moment breath

It’s still here live it

YOUR JACKET

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 2, 2026

Alone

I sit here,

And you have left your jacket

     The blue jeans jacket   

     With the golden snap buttons _ and the one that is missing

     _ with the zipper zipping up and down on the shoulders, the     

                                                                 pockets, the arms _  

      Then discover, caught in one, your hair _ black, black

                                      and  long _ a wavy dark thread

Too big, the sleeves hang limp over my hands;

I am in your jacket, in you _ almost _

Almost the way you feel so good against and inside of me

I’m covered

By the cast skin of your skin

      Like the dry brown shells that

            Yellow butterflies leave

                  behind

I smell your smell

They way a baby smiles

      inside

The Mother’s arms _

      thick and soft and

            there

      always, always _

I will sleep with your jacket _

      cuddle it, feeling it under my palms, kiss it, tell it my dreams

I smell your smell, resting my cheek against a sleeve

I smell your smell

      breathing deep

      and deeper

I miss and wish it were

      you

But your jacket has fallen asleep

                  quietly

Next to me.

This is a poem I wrote some time back so it is about young love. I decided I still like this poem and so I didn’t change a word. It’s wonderful this challenge made me remember the poem, all of a sudden. It took some rummaging through stacks of books and drawers that hadn’t been opened in ages, but I did find it, published in a literary magazine called Women Talking Women Listening, out of California. Now this poem is reborn, online. I am so happy. Today’s theme was “jacket.”

ZEN

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 3, 2026

Close your eyes

Forget  

Those grudges

You will never forget

Even those

You’ve long forgotten

Like old cotton fog  

Burn a single stick of incense

Preferably

The one that smells like lavender

But is deep orange in color

Take a deep breath

Wipe out those faces, those voices, those aches,

Slaps, kicks, abuse, ridicule, words and thoughts that hurt

Hurled not at others by you

But by others to you

And now forget about you

Or anyone else

Your children

Your grandchildren

Including those you never had

The love of your life

You had that

And let nothingness seep in

Like that old cotton fog

Except

Now

It’s clear

Invisible

And nothing matters

CHAOS

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 4, 2026

The House on Second Avenue

The shutters are always banging

A drum machine keeping time

Down the block from Eddie Moore’s house

Around the corner from Russel Baba’s house

^__<

The House on Second Avenue

Robert Kikuchi Yngojo from San Jose

And Duke Santos, a conga player who’s also a

Paramedic saving lives on the ambulance,

Live in the basement rooms

^__<

The House on Second Avenue

Rickety wooden stairs lead to our doorway,  

We’re upstairs, you and me,

With Aileen, who plays the qin,

And Richard, who’s white and gay

^__<

The House on Second Avenue

We share the kitchen, bathrooms, our dreams,  

Not a care in the world except for Truth,

Justice, John Coltrane;

Musicians, dancers, poets

^__<

The House on Second Avenue

We could walk to Golden Gate Park

Or down to Clement Street

We’d sit for hours over coffee and a croissant

And run into Randy Senzaki’s wife strolling their son

^__<

The House on Second Avenue

Birds taking flight in a buzzing hushed whirl

From that tree right outside our window

Doves, you’d call them,

Though I knew they’re just pigeons

^__<

The House on Second Avenue

Where magic brewed and ceilings shook,

In time to the downbeat during rehearsals

And to promises of forever at night,

All shrugged off like the breaths we took

BOOK

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 5, 2026

Let’s read a book together, Mommy

You would say in that sweet little child voice

Eric Carle, Dr. Seuss, Maurice Sendak

Margaret Wise Brown

That faraway smell of paper with ink

We breathe in together as we turn the pages

Your warm body snuggled next to mine

Bedtime story time

That daily ritual

Like the morning cereal with “mook”

Our adventures gliding on the stroller  

We forget when it ended

Just the way I was never sure

When you’d fallen asleep  

IMPOSTER

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 6, 2026

We laugh at the jokes

Ride the bus standing still

Show up at the office

Read emails

Take a lunch break

After the Zoom

A shadow

Lining the landscape

Never questioning

No matter how illiterate or inane

Devoted to being normal

Uncontested, conforming, proven

Making sure

That deadly darkness

Never shows

Except in poetry

Scribbled in secret

Like silent gems

CONVERSATION

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 7, 2026

My recent poem “What Do You Think” is perfect for today’s word, “Conversation.” And the perfect song below by Ryu Miho.

https://on.soundcloud.com/azCKDBweZ4iSsd57xs

MASTERPIECE

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 8, 2026

Years ago, I went to the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam. Today, I saw the works again in Tokyo. I once asked my partner if Van Gogh was happy having all these people gawking at his works, likely for the wrong reasons. And he assured me Van Gogh was happy.

Alien

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 9, 2026

Ching Chong Chinaman

Sitting on a fence

That sing-song taunt

That face in your face

Skin stretched way back

Till eyes are slanted slits

The freckled boy

Spits out that word

Laughing on the school bus

I had to come home and

Ask my father

What it meant: Jap

EMERGENCY

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 10, 2026

The ground shook and shook

On that day, March 11, 2011,

For a very long time

The earth was heaving madly  

It felt like everything was ready to end

But that was just the beginning

Smoke spewed on the TV news

As reactors sank into meltdowns

In the worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl     

LULLABYE

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 11. 2026

Neeen nen Okohrori Okohroriyoooo

Booya wa Iiikoda Neeen ne Shi nah

You would always start crying

When I sang that old lullabye

Not crying sad

But just soooooo moved

Though you probably didn’t

Understand the words

It’s a feeling

Handed down generations

Over starry nights

From the Edo Era

No one remembers the writers

But all mothers sing

That mother of songs  

So hushed you can barely hear it

You are so precious

You are a good boy

We have so much to do tomorrow

But let’s go to sleep now   

CANDLE

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 12, 2026

Can’t have them lit

Around the house

Because Japan has

Earthquakes

So it’s not safe

Although their flickering flames

Wafting wax scent

Glimmering glow of soft orange

We all remember growing up

When the power went out

After the shakings

And we look at each other

Bright round faces

Gathered around fear

Staring together

At that one source of light

TRIBE

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 13, 2026

Mono no aware

To be or not to be

Things fall apart

A room of one’s own

The sound of water

One hundred years of solitude   

So blessed we are

To be natives

Of this eternal tribe

7-ELEVEN

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 14, 2026

She’s punching the cash register

The name tag says “Pretty” in romaji,

Her mother chose that name

The newborn was so pretty

I don’t ask her where she is from

Maybe Vietnam, maybe China, I don’t ask

It’s enough that she is Pretty

I remember being in Pyongyang

For a reporting trip many years ago,

The young man assigned to guide us

Told me he knows a Japanese song

Then sang in perfect Japanese

Konnichiwa akachan

Hello, my little baby, hello

ELSEWHERE

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 15, 2026

This is the song that should be playing in the background for my poem.

It’s been months

But you are still here

Your guitar

A closet drawer filled with Hanes underwear

Joe Pass Chord Solos

The note you wrote to yourself

On a piece of recycled cardboard:

“What is depression if not life stripped of its illusions”

Like all your notes, words scribbled and sheet music,

The amp in that huge black case with wheels

You wanted to give away to Hide

You told me you can no longer play

But I wanted to keep it and still do

Just like I never will let you go

I will keep seeing you, feeling your touch

Talk to me, talk to yourself,

Whispering our son’s name again and again

Then the magic words: “My son”

Please stay

Close

Here

This whole challenge has made me write things I’d never had thought of writing. That’s because we almost always start with our own topics, whatever we have been thinking about. We take that for granted. Now we have to reach to places we wouldn’t have otherwise gone, like scratching that spot on your back. Or feeling something in your brain behind your ear give. It’s sometimes a painful experience. But you know it’s good for you, as a poet, as a person who is alive, and a part of humanity, as that is what this group reminds us there is.

FRAME

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 16, 2026

Many years ago,

I knew a violin player

Raymond Cheng

Really a genius

Known as The Wizard

Recorded with Lester Bowie

Wild glorious notes coming from nowhere

And then sinking deep in people’s souls

Skinny, soft-spoken,

Raymond once asked me at Jigoku’s, a J-town bar,

To watch his violin

And being so young and scattered

I didn’t pay much attention to his instrument

Which probably cost as much as a luxury car

I was told, wow, he really likes you,

Raymond asking you to watch his violin

As though that was very special

But it was no more special

Than the innocence of youth

The love songs we wrote to hum by the day  

And the stars that became gems at night

CRYSTAL

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 17, 2026

The little crystal snowflake hanging from a branch

Flashes a mini rainbow on our apartment ceiling

Always glimmering clearly if you care to look

Though it has all these colors inside, ready to break out

It’s like how you just smile when I say the most horrid things

About your music, that it wasn’t yours at all,

But the geniuses you played with

You knew I was just angry

And I love you, and your music, so much

You, being wise to the crystal-clear fact

That it’s everybody’s music  

OVERFLOW

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 18, 2026

Tears are stored in your system. They come out when the valve gets turned. Unfortunately, the valve is not in your control. At first, when the sorrow hits, it’s numb and doesn’t turn on at all. There are no tears. After about half a year, for some reason, the tears start coming, but there is still no control. It happens when you see objects that remind you of this happening, this person, this sorrow, the memories. Often in the morning. But sometimes at night, too. I am not sure what the experts say. If it’s good for your state of mind, soothing and healing and therapeutic. Or if it just makes things worse. And it’s better to try to forget. It doesn’t matter anyway. You don’t really have a choice. It goes on for years, I’m told. Because the love you feel is so much greater than all the tears combined.

TRACE

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 19. 2026

My son Isaku made a song using AI Sono from my poem. It’s really nice so please check it out from the SoundCloud link below:

https://soundcloud.com/yuri-kageyama/i-cant-remember-the-name-of

I can’t remember the name of that café

I can’t remember the name of that café

The one we used to sit for hours

Now I remember

Toy Boat

Around the corner from Clement Street

Near pediatrician Dr. Tsumori’s house

What did we talk about

Why didn’t we care

About wasting time, about time at all?

We had all the time in the world

Not a fear or a care except our belief

That came from nowhere

Like our poems, our music, our love

COMPASS

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 20, 2026

The girl who was jealous of my grades

Plopped a nicely wrapped gift on my desk

I opened it with joy but inside was toilet paper

She laughed: Look at her face

I looked her in the eye and said: Thank you.  

^__<

The hands groping my breasts

Though as a child I didn’t have any  

Then those hands reached down slowly  

I couldn’t move the train was so crowded

My mother later said: It’s dangerous, stay quiet.   

^__<

We grow up in a crazed chaotic world

Promised a compass only in textbooks

Those nifty little needles telling you

Which way is north, south, west or east

They never say: This is right, and that is wrong.

ARRIVAL

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 21, 2026

Plum petals barely open   

Tea green wings flutter

Blur of wafting sweetness

Telling us so clearly

Like how life can go on  

In the deepest darkness  

Spring is here

Spring is really here

To illustrate my poem about the arrival of spring, I used the photo of my latest Ikenobo Ikebana.

RECORD

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 22, 2026

A reminiscence expert told me once

It’s OK to relive the Past

Over and over

Some people don’t have a future

And I thought what a ridiculous idea

I was young then

With thoughts only on

What might be coming

Not what’s already over

Discarded, forgotten

Now I know she was right

What’s Past can be

More precious

Than anything you might ever know,

Vivid and more real

Because time is not a line

But a now,

Those moments  

Loved and cherished

SNOB

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 23, 2026

And thanks again to AI Sono and the Kageyama team, here is the musical hiphop version of the poem:

https://soundcloud.com/yuri-kageyama/going-into-the-studio?si=60964dae980243b0b723482978a14a2c&utm_source=clipboard&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=social_sharing

Going into the studio

Working on a book

Headed to that power meeting

You possibly can’t be a part

Glass ceiling or prison bars

A divide so final

Race color gender class or national origin

What they have that you don’t

You can only hope to peek

Feeling left out

Worthless unfit debased

Remember you don’t need them

But they need you

Here

Below

To elevate them

REDACTED

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 24, 2026

“Redacted”

The Poetry Challenge word for today

It’s a hard one

I had to Google

What it meant

To be sure

Not a word one utters often

Or a concept to even think about

Those lines marked in ink

So no one sees

What was there

That isn’t fit

To be seen  

CATS

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 25, 2026

Pyonta a beautiful black cat

I got for free while at Cornell

Where dogs were allowed to

Roam the campus even in class

Because Ezra Cornell loved dogs

So I also had a dog named Columbo  

Who would run with me in the snow

So gentle he loved Pyonta

And all the cats Pyonta brought home

Pyonta would purr, snuggling next to Columbo

Who’d look so troubled like he couldn’t move   

When Pyonta ran around sometimes right into

Our neighbor’s apartment

We would yell: Pyonta Pyonta

The neighbor, not knowing

Pyonta refers to “hopping”

In Japanese, shouted:

Hilda Hilda

This photo my friend saved from many years back just popped up on social media. That’s Columbo back when I was a student at Cornell. Isn’t he so perfectly gorgeous? I probably have photos of Pyonta somewhere, too.

MIRROR

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 26, 2026

I hate seeing my reflection in the mirror.

I always look away.

It’s not that I consider myself utterly ugly.

I’m just embarrassed.  

The same way I can never smile in photos.

That person looking back, oddly visible.

When a face should be simply a window

Used to look out from what’s within.

SKELETON

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 27, 2026

My poet friend says

She is a top candidate

To be one of those people

In the news lately

Who’re found dead

Alone in their Apartments

Days, weeks, maybe months after;

No one cared to notice

Until a strange smell wafted

Through the door?

Kodokushi, it’s called in Japan,

Yes, there is a special term,  

So common here,

Where the population is aging

And no one is getting married

Or having children;

One’s fate is to die alone

Some check into nursing homes ahead of time

Those less fortunate get found after the fact

LIES

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 28, 2026

You tell me I look nice

When I get my hair done

Or wear a new outfit

Never mind

I usually have to point out

I got my hair done or bought new clothes

It’s just to say: I love you

The same way I love you

And always have, from the day we met

So many many many many years ago

It’s not a lie; of course, not

Because nothing has changed

The absolute, never changing, total truth

POP

Sharing a poetry reading from seven years ago by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 29, 2026

A collaboration with artist Munenori Tamagawa, who considers himself the Basquiat of Japan, Radio the Artist, who live-painted with Munenori and did the video below, and Hirokazu Jackson Suyama on percussion. Our bit starts at 6:00 minutes, and it fits the word for today, “POP.”

SMILE

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 30, 2026

You smiled

Suddenly

In the silence after your first breath of a wail

So still and serious,

Testing the corner muscles of your mouth

Forgetting for a moment your instinct to suckle

Looking with your miracle almond eyes into my eyes,

Hello

Hello

Hello

Pleased to meet you.

A tiny crooked

But perfect

Smile.

They say:

Newborns don’t smile for weeks.

I decide

You are just a genius

Today’s word was “Smile.” This is a poem I wrote some years ago but it seemed to fit the bill, although the original title was “The Crooked Smile,” but “Smile” is a better title. I remember like it was yesterday, that moment, and how happy he was _ the man, who’d just become a father. He carried the swaddled newborn around in the hospital like it was the most precious thing. The saxophone player who was his best friend laughed and said when his son was born a few years ago, he’d thrown him in the air. I hope that wasn’t moments after the birth. Birth is a wonderful moment. And welcoming this special person into this world is a big smile that we should remember forever. Stop crying. Smile.

DELETE

by Yuri Kageyama

Jan. 31, 2026

Slant-eyed in the U.S.,

Talking pidgin, yellow skin,

Eating sushi,

I grew up with racism.

Being a girl in Japan,

Three steps behind the man,

Last to be hired,

I know sexism well.     

Old people look alike,

Regardless of race or sex,

I prayed to be set free

But all I got was agism.