DAILY PHOTO: Mount Pandim

Taken in May of 2022 in Sikkim on the Goechala Trail

DAILY PHOTO: Tsoka Gompa from Above

Taken in May of 2022 on the trail to Goechala

Prek Chu [Haiku]

soft, shrubby shoulders
line Prek Chu's winding way
of smooth, white boulders

DAILY PHOTO: Mt. Pandim

Taken in May of 2022 at the Lamuney campsite

Mossy Tough [Haiku]

rolling stone: no moss?
it thrives in cold, flowing streams
of Himalaya

DAILY PHOTO: Clouds Over Mountains, McLeodganj

Taken in June of 2015 above McLeodganj in Himachal Pradesh

Mountain Oasis [Haiku]

in pale-brown mountains,
we round a curve to see
a lush oasis

DAILY PHOTO: Nubra Valley

Taken in Nubra Valley in August of 2016

Himalayan Nettle [Villanelle]

The hardy Himalayan nettle stings.
It felt like punching piles of jellyfish. 
The slightest brush feels like a snapped bowstring.

But the balm of time bowstrings quickly bring.
The nettle's cure proved far more standoffish.
The hardy Himalayan nettle stings. 

Two days on, the nettle still sent its ping.
My hand numb like I'd fondled Fugu fish.
That slightest brush felt like a snapped bowstring.

I put my useless limb in a web sling. 
Not really, but it did hurt fiercely-ish.
That hardy Himalayan nettle stings.

Oh! of such agony Divas do sing.
Not really, but it was unpleasant-ish.
The slightest brush felt like a snapped bowstring.

Stabbed by roadside nettle in Darjeeling
is a fate upon no one I would wish.
The hardy Himalayan nettle stings.
The slightest brush feels like a snapped bowstring.

DAILY PHOTO: Red Pandas: In Action, Zoning Out, and At Rest

Taken in December of 2021 at the Padmaja Naidu Himalayan Zoological Park of Darjeeling