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Thread: Haiku Habitat
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  1. TopTop #31
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    Moon moves down the sky
    westward as tree-shadows flow
    eastward and vanish.

    Buson - Translated by Harry Behn, More Cricket Songs, 1971

    Harry Behn (1898 - 1973) was a translator of haiku in the 60's and early 70's. Behn was a poet, children's books author, and Hollywood screenwriter, as well as a translator. His haiku translations were published by Harcourt Brace and widely read. A lot of people learned about Japanese haiku from Behn's translations.

    Buson (1716 to 1784) was a haiku poet and painter. During his lifetime he was known more for his painting than as a poet. In fact, he had faded into obscurity as a haiku poet soon after his death. It was Masaoka Shiki (1867 - 1902) who rediscovered Buson and praised Buson's skill as a haiku poet in his weekly newspaper column. Since then Buson is recognized for his skill, in particular his strongly visual presentations within the haiku form.

    This haiku is an example of what I call an 'extended moment' haiku. Buson is depicting a process that takes place during an entire evening; if Buson is referring to a full moon the process of the interaction between moonlight and shadows on the earth takes the entire night. In contemporary English Language Haiku discourse the idea is often put forward of the 'haiku moment', but which is meant the 'haiku instant'. I think of this approach as turning a haiku into a snapshot. But some haiku are what I think of as videos rather than photographs of a moment; these 'video' haiku encompass a process; in fact the process is primary in this type of haiku. Both Buson and Basho wrote haiku of this extended moment type and I think we should be open to that approach in the anglosphere as well.
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  3. TopTop #32
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    What can I say to
    The butterfly that just flew
    Past me, changing hue?

    MA. Milagros T. Dumdum - Falling on Quiet Water

    Milagros T. Dumdum is a contemporary haiku poet from Cebu, Philippines. She writes in several languages, including English. I find her work to be superbly constructed and a joy to read. Many of her poems reflect her strong Catholic tradition and that she lives in an extended-family household. There is also an emphasis on communing with nature as in this haiku.

    I decided to post this haiku because it is an example of a triple-end-rhyme haiku: to / flew/ hue. That's unusual, though I have seen a haiku by James Hackett that uses triple end-rhyme. The author uses rhyme now and then; like most English Language Haiku poets she considers rhyme and option, but does not demand it. What I find in this haiku is how the cheerfulness of the end-rhyme merges with the picture that the haiku presents; it is an overall cheerful scene and it feels to me that the triple end-rhyme is a good vehicle for expressing that cheerfulness.
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  5. TopTop #33
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    White chrysanthemum . . .
    Before that perfect flower
    Scissors hesitate

    Buson - Translated by Peter Beilenson, A Haiku Garland, 1968

    Peter Beilenson founded Peter Pauper Press with his wife Edna. The Press was founded in 1931, Peter died in 1962 and Edna continued running the Press until her death in 1981. Peter Pauper Press is still a successful publishing company. The Press specialized in gift books, journals, and games.

    Peter Beilenson published four volumes of translations of haiku in small gift book format. The last of the four was finished by Harry Behn after Beilenson died. There was a long friendship between Behn and Beilenson as they both shared an interest in haiku at a time when haiku was not widespread. After Beilenson died the Press gathered the translations from the four gift books and published 'A Haiku Garland' in 1968 that contains all the haiku from the previous four volumes. I think there are about 700 haiku in total. They are arranged seasonally in 'A Haiku Garland.' Beilenson translated haiku from many different Japanese haiku poets, not just the big three of Basho, Buson, and Issa. Beilenson's gift books introduced to many Americans a wide range of Japanese haiku poets, giving readers a sense of the many different ways there are of approaching haiku. As an anthology of Japanese haiku in English I think it still is worth reading and, in some ways, surpasses some of the newer anthologies of Japanese haiku translated into English. If you can find a used copy it is worth spending time with it.
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  7. TopTop #34
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    Merciful autumn
    Tones down the shabby curtains
    Of my rented room.

    Richard Wright -- September 4, 1908 – November 28, 1960 - Haiku 174

    Today is the anniversary of the death of Richard Wright. Each year I take time to think about Wright's contribution to English Language Haiku and to read some haiku from his collection. In my first post on this thread, Haiku Habitat, I posted a haiku from Wright and suggested that if your read only one book of English Language Haiku, this is the one to read. Over the years I have found that Wright's collection bears rereading and a door to contemplation.

    The great gift of Wright's haiku is that he merges the traditional parameters of Japanese haiku with the heritage of English language poetry in a way that looks effortless. I see this approach as the way forward for English Language Haiku.

    If you have a moment today, take a few moments to read some of his haiku. Let them settle into your mind and heart. It is definitely worth the time.
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  9. TopTop #35
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    In an autumn wind,
    looking through a box of books
    left on the corner

    Tom Tico - Spring Morning Sun

    Tom Tico was a San Francisco haiku poet. His haiku appear in early English language haiku journals. Many of his haiku see the world from the perspective of homelessness; he was homeless for a number of years. As far as I know he published only one collection of his haiku, Spring Morning Sun, which is a wonderful and heartfelt collection.
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  11. TopTop #36
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    Rusty car body
    All that remains of a hope
    Once so dearly held

    Charles Walker - Haiku and High Timber, 2010

    Charles Walker learned about haiku when he was part of the U.S. occupation of Japan right after WW II. Walker became acquainted with a local haiku poet who introduced Walker to how haiku is written and the focus of haiku. Walker took to haiku and wrote it for the rest of his adult life. But it was only in 2009 that a friend suggested that Walker publish a collection. The result was 'Haiku and High Timber'. The collection has a local focus; meaning that they reflect the area where Walker lives, Eastern Oregon. I like that local focus. And you can see the influence of his Japanese haiku teacher in the seasonal arrangement of the haiku, which is the standard pattern in which Japanese haiku are presented.

    Walker is skillful at using phrases that are repeated, sometimes with slight modification, throughout the collection. This kind of repetition gives the collection a sense of unity, almost like the phrase is a refrain. It weaves the haiku together so that the haiku in the collection feel like they are part of a larger whole, even though any single haiku can stand on its own.
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  13. TopTop #37
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    Dark in the cabin.
    No lamp but the blue moon of
    the computer screen.

    Mary Jo Salter -- Open Shutters, 2003

    Mary Jo Salter is a contemporary poet, editor, and teacher. Her work is widely admired. She was one of the three editors for the 5th edition of the Norton Anthology of English poetry; the great big book of English language poetry, an anthology that begins with Anglo-Saxon poetry and concludes with near contemporaries. This is the first edition of the Norton Anthology that includes English language haiku; specifically selections from the haiku of Richard Wright. It was Mary Jo Salter who advocated for the inclusion of Wright's haiku. In an interview I read she spoke of how much she admired Wright's haiku and how pervasively influential they have been, how they set the standard for English language haiku. It was a nice feeling for me to see English language haiku included right along with sonnets, etc., and to see Wright's haiku find a place in the canon.

    Salter does not write a lot of haiku. Usually she writes a short series of haiku, about six of them, and includes the haiku in a book of poems. This is often the approach that poets take; it resembles including a villanelle in a book of poetry.

    This haiku is packed with meaning. Structurally, it consists of two phrases; notice the lack of a verb in either phrase. The haiku presents an intriguing intersection of the natural and human worlds by using a natural metaphor (blue moon) for a technological experience (the light at night from the computer screen). I think you could spend a lot of time commenting on the implications of a haiku like this.
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  15. TopTop #38
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    Dark and light, sweet sounds
    from crickets and soaring hawks.
    A hundred eons?

    Edith Shiffert -- The Unswept Path: Contemporary American Haiku, Edited by John Brandi and Dennis Maloney, 2005

    I'm posting another Shiffert haiku because I enjoy her approach. This is another example of Shiffert's 'time shift haiku'. In this case line 3 places the events of lines 1 & 2 into a much grander temporal context.

    Line 1 introduces two abstractions; dark and light. Line 2 offers two sounds; crickets and soaring hawks, presumably the cry of the hawk is heard.

    Line 3 offers a temporal context that embraces both pairs of things. Sounds naturally appear together, but the pair dark and light are experienced as negating each other. We even have spiritually sayings that rely on their mutual exclusion such as 'one candle disperses the darkness'.

    Seen from the perspective of eons, though, if an eon is taken to be a moment in time, then light and dark occupy the same temporal field in the same way that the sound of the crickets and the cry of the hawk occupy the same temporal field. In Daoism this is the circle that encompasses the field of dark and light. This kind of understanding can be experienced through some kind of contemplative discipline that leads to the unity of eternity.
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  16. TopTop #39
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    Pulsing lights, low hum,
    Granny prays, hunting dogs whine:
    Spaceship lands in swamp.

    Mary K. Witte -- Redneck Haiku: Double-Wide Edition, 2005

    This is an example of popular haiku. Haiku has become a popular art form, like poker or gospel music or genre films like sci-fi. Popular haiku sells very well and I suspect that a large number of people are introduced to haiku through collections of popular haiku. The two best-sellers of popular haiku are 'Haikus for Jews' by Bader (I'll post later), and this collection, 'Redneck Haiku'.

    Popular haiku has several characteristics. It is local, often concerned with a sub-culture (e.g. Jewish culture in New York for 'Haikus for Jews', or trailer trash for 'Redneck Haiku'), often incorporates local dialect, usually humorous but can also be poignant, deliberately low brow, often connected with popular culture tropes like this haiku with its cultural reference to a type of sci-fi adventure.

    Also, popular haiku is disconnected from haiku journals or haiku societies; these journals and societies tend to be consciously literary and use a type of English that I think of as 'University English' as opposed to the local dialect of a sub-culture often used in popular haiku. The two approaches to haiku almost never cross paths. Literary haiku tends to look down on popular haiku, just as University culture in general tends to look down on popular culture. And popular haiku authors seem to be addressing a different audience; for example, often popular haiku collections are placed in the humor section of bookstores rather than the poetry section.

    It is fascinating to me how the 5-7-5 form has permeated the anglosphere so that we find it used by professional poets such as Paul Muldoon and Mary Jo Salter, literary haiku poets dedicated to the haiku form, and also in popular culture as a means for expressing the experience of a specific sub-culture, its concerns and views. I think this is remarkable; I'm not sure I can come up with another poetic form that spread so widely so quickly.

    Personally, I enjoy popular haiku, its humor, its ability to open a window on cultural experiences I am not familiar with. And I am grateful for its ability to popularize haiku and make it accessible to ordinary people.
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  18. TopTop #40
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    chrysanthemums bloom
    in a mason's yard between
    all the blocks of stone

    Basho - translated by John White and Kemmyo Taira Sato, The Haiku of Basho, 2019

    Last year John White and Kemmyo Taira Sato published three volumes of haiku translations from the Japanese: one volume for Basho, one for Buson, and one for Issa. The books are beautifully put together with thick pages and a layout that includes the original Japanese in a vertical line (the standard way for writing Japanese haiku), a romaji transliteration, followed by an English translation. The Basho and Buson volumes also include examples of their painting and calligraphy.

    The translations are syllabic and the translators also attempt to mimic sonic effects found in the original when that is possible. The translators are both Pure Land Buddhist practitioners who belong to the Buddhist Society in the UK. This personal involvement in Pure Land Buddhism informs their translation and is especially helpful in their translation of Issa who was a Pure Land Buddhist practitioner.

    The translators are particularly attentive to rhythm, both in the original Japanese and how rhythm works in English. There is a tendency in haiku translations from Japanese haiku to not take rhythm into account; especially when the translation is into free verse, and doubly so when the translator has minimalist inclinations.

    This new set of translations from the Japanese is a welcome addition to the treasure-trove of translated Japanese haiku that retain the formal characteristics of the original.
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  20. TopTop #41
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    Autumn waterfall --
    as if a horse's tail kept
    shaking and shaking

    Ishizaki Rokufu -- Translated by James Kirkup, A Certain State of Mind, 1995
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  22. TopTop #42
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    Concord visitors
    drink the wine of morning air,
    break the bread of words.

    Raymond Roseliep - August 11, 1917 to December 6, 1983
    Flute Over Walden, 1976
    Thoreau Journal Quarterly, 1973
    Quoted in 'Raymond Roseliep: Man of Art Who Loves the Rose' by Donna Bauerly

    Raymond Roseliep was a poet and Catholic Priest in rural Iowa where he lived his entire life. Early in his poetry writing he wrote long form poems. Many of these poems were syllabic, meaning they had the same number of syllables per line but did not share a metrical structure. I feel that this syllabic approach, and his skill with it, made it easier for him to approach haiku which is a syllabic form in its traditional structure. Roseliep turned to haiku gradually, eventually becoming his primary means of poetic expression. His early haiku are syllabic and traditional. I find them very compelling and introspective. Unfortunately, from my perspective, Roseliep became enamored of a minimalist approach to haiku and I think this limited his range of expression; more than a few critics also share this observation. Minimalism became a prominent movement in North American Haiku in the 70's and advocated for a short count, along with a huge number of linguistic restrictions. It's interesting, though, that Roseliep did not sign on to all the minimalist limitations of that decade. For example, Roseliep argued strongly that metaphor and simile should be an important part of haiku poetry, a position the minimalists opposed.

    Roseliep's journey through English Language Haiku is an intriguing one. His shifts in style reflect the changing tastes of that time, and at the same time his commitment to the art of poetry shaped his haiku into a mode of expression that stands out and still speaks to us decades later.

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  24. TopTop #43
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    from these scattered shards
    the young archeologist
    describes the clay pot

    Evelyn Tooley Hunt - Wind Chimes Haiku Journal, 13, 1984

    Evelyn Tooley Hunt (1904 to 1997) is best known as a poet who wrote the poem 'Taught Me Purple', which lead to the novel 'The Color Purple' by Alice Walker. But Hunt was also a haiku poet who sometimes published haiku under the pen name Tao-Li.

    This haiku is a single sentence haiku. I see it as a contemplation on time and how the past leaves its mark on the present, though that mark is often hidden and needs to be decoded.
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  26. TopTop #44
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    Smell of the river
    casting a line of daydreams
    into my window.

    Michael Moore - Haiku Landscapes, 2004

    Michael Moore (no relationship to the famous film maker) published this collection, marking a turn in his creative output. Moore writes that this collection marks a 'departure' from his previous published collections which took a more free form, or free verse, approach. This interests me because it replicates my own haiku journey. I started out writing free verse haiku because that was the approach taken by people around me and it is also the approach advocated by official haiku organizations and journals. Later, when I became more acquainted with the rich treasure trove of formal haiku, haiku in 5-7-5, I found the approach more expressive and more in touch with the original Japanese. I began writing formal haiku, gradually finding satisfaction within its formal parameters. There are a lot of formal haiku poets who have made the same journey. There is something innately attractive about the 5-7-5 rhythm, the framing of haiku within traditional parameters, that encourages creativity and individual expression. When I think of this journey I am reminded of a verse from Bob Dylan's song, 'Shelter from the Storm': I came in from the wilderness / A creature void of form / Come in, she said, I'll give you / Shelter from the storm.
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  28. TopTop #45
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    Small bird, forgive me.
    I'll hear the end of your song
    in some other world.

    Anonymous -- Translated by Harry Behn, More Cricket Songs, 1971

    Anonymous haiku, and tanka, are numerous in Japanese poetic culture. The 9th century collection of over 1100 tanka, Kokinwakashu, contains hundreds of anonymous tanka. And collections of seasonal haiku, saijiki, in Japan also contain anonymous haiku. I think this is an indication of how pervasive poetic culture is in Japan. Anonymous haiku emerge from popular, or folk, culture. I see them as spontaneous poetic expression; perhaps the haiku was first given voice at a party, or in this case a funeral or a celebration for the deceased, or perhaps at a bar with a gathering of friends; we don't know. But others who heard it recalled it and passed it on to others. Something like, 'Hey Tony, last night I heard this haiku, some guy at the other end of the bar . . . '

    There is also in Japan a tradition of a 'death poem'. This isn't necessarily a poem written at death (though there are such poems, Basho, for example, wrote a beautiful death poem just before passing). More often it is a poem written to be read at one's funeral, a kind of farewell or last word to one's friends and loved ones. I think this poem may have served that function.
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  30. TopTop #46
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    When a thing is said,
    The lips become very cold
    Like the autumn wind.

    Basho - Translated by Daniel C. Buchanan, One Hundred Famous Haiku, 1973

    Buchanan's 100 translations of famous haiku was published in 1973. Buchanan's approach to translation was more scholarly than that of Beilensen or Behn. Each haiku contains the Japanese original, than a transliteration, followed by a translation, and finally each haiku contains a brief, one paragraph, commentary by Buchanan. The translations are syllabic, in the 5-7-5 form, which replicates the 5-7-5 structure of the Japanese. This collection was a good introduction to haiku for many in the U.S. who wanted to go a bit deeper than what is offered in the Behn and Beilensen translations. It's too bad that this collection is out of print; the translations remain excellent and the commentary is helpful. It remains a good introduction to Japanese haiku.
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  32. TopTop #47
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    The falling snow flakes
    Cannot blunt the hard aches nor
    Match the steel stillness.

    Etheridge Knight -- The Essential Etheridge Knight, 1991

    Etheridge Knight (1931 to 1991) was an African American poet who used his poetic skills to communicate the African American prison experience. His first collection of poetry was 'Poems from Prison' in 1968. Knight had lifelong drug problems which devolved to him being arrested for armed robbery in the early sixties. When he was released he married Sonia Sanchez, but because of ongoing drug difficulties their relationship ended after two years. Sanchez writes about this in some of her poetry.

    I'm not sure when Knight encountered haiku. It was either in prison when he became serious about poetry, or possibly from Sonia Sanchez who also was attracted to haiku. It is worth pointing out that Black involvement with English language haiku goes way back to the early decades of the 20th century. Black magazines like The Crisis published haiku and also articles about haiku prosody. And poets in the Harlem Renaissance were involved with both haiku and tanka. In some ways I think of these explorations and influences as pivotal for the development of English language haiku. In the case of both Knight and Sanchez it may have been this general background of black involvement in haiku that connected them to the form. (I don't think they were aware of Richard Wright's haiku because Wright was in France when he wrote his haiku; but a few of Wright's haiku were published in Ebony, so they might have been aware of those specific examples.)

    Knight's haiku are, at one and the same time, objective and passionate. His uses metaphor and simile like a sharp blade. The images stay with the reader as they speak of uneasy things.
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  34. TopTop #48
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    Dew catches the sun
    and floods the windshield with light.
    Two-car accident.

    Jim Jones -- Police Blotter Haiku, 2014

    'Police Blotter Haiku' is a good example of the popular haiku genre. The 'police blotter' is a daily record of police activity. The blotter includes the foibles of ordinary people such as behavior when drunk or drugged, arguments that get out of hand or too noisy for the neighbors, nasty break-ups, etc. The haiku in this collection are grouped by the type of difficulty such as 'Men, Women and Wretched Exes, Bad Behavior, Questionable Judgment, Much Outrage About Nothing, etc. These scenes, captured in 5-7-5, reveal human beings when they are lacking in good judgment and/or common sense. We have all seen this kind of behavior and I suspect all of us have participated in it at moments in our lives.

    Many of the haiku are humorous, but more than a few are poignant. The author clearly has sympathy for human beings in their imperfection.

    Jones self-published this collection and used kickstarter to finance it. These new ways of getting into print are a boon to English language haiku; they have given access to both publishing and circulation for many haiku poets who otherwise would not have had such access.

    I like the way this particular haiku is constructed. It starts with a setup for a nature haiku. Line 3 is an unexpected twist. I hope the accident wasn't too serious.
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  36. TopTop #49
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    Through autumnal dusk
    the smoke of leaves curls itself
    in a question mark.

    Charles Shaw -- American Haiku, Vol. II, No. 1, 1964

    I don't know much about Charles Shaw. His haiku appear in early haiku journals fairly frequently.

    I discovered some years ago that there is a huge treasure trove of well-written formal haiku from the 60's and 70's that has been dropped down the memory whole. Very few people writing English language haiku today are aware of this. This has led to a distorted understanding of the brief history of ELH (English language haiku). I like to bring into the present this unmined trove of formal haiku both because it is excellently crafted and because I think we today can build on the approach of these many poets.

    I try to track down information about the poets I find in the pages of American Haiku, the first English language haiku journal and sometimes I do find out some interesting information. But a surprising number have vanished, known only by their name. In some cases their gender is not even know because they used an initial for their first name, or their first name is used by more than one gender; e.g. 'Pat'. In some instances they contributed only one or two well-crafted haiku to American Haiku, never to be in print again as far as I have been able to discover. In a way, they are like the 'anonymous' haiku found in Japanese collections.

    I find his haiku well-crafted, with a simple syntax. In this haiku Shaw concludes with a metaphor that expands the meaning of the simple scene depicted in lines 1 & 2.
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  37. TopTop #50
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    The peasant hoes on.
    The person who asked the way
    Is now out of sight.

    Buson - Translated by Patrick C. Buchanan, 100 Famous Haiku, 1973
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  39. TopTop #51
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    She rubs her cold hands
    a thousand times, even ten
    thousand times over.

    Seishi Yamaguchi -- The Essence of Modern Haiku, Translated by Takashi Kodaira and Alfred H. Marks

    I posted a haiku by Yamaguchi before that was translated by James Kirkup, from an anthology of translations from the Japanese. This translation is entirely haiku written by Yamaguchi. It was published by Tuttle in 1993. Each haiku contains the Japanese original with romanization below the Japanese. Then there is an English translation. In the notes to each haiku Yamaguchi gives the reader a brief commentary. Finally, each haiku has some footnotes that point out the season word for the haiku and discuss some vocabulary and its associations in the original Japanese. That makes this volume a great introduction to how Japanese understand the art of haiku; for the dedicated English language haiku poet this is a good way to enter into the Japanese context and background.

    This haiku is a single sentence haiku (that's true even in the original Japanese) with a focus on a single moment; a common response to cold weather. Haiku like this might, at first reading, seem insignificant. But what I think is being shown in this type of haiku is how human life is shaped by the natural world both in small and large ways, a truth that human beings often forget.
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  41. TopTop #52
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    i have died and dreamed
    myself back to your arms where
    what i died for sleeps.

    Sonia Sanchez -- Wounded in the House of a Friend, 1995
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  43. TopTop #53
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    This cold winter night
    no bird sings; just the old moon
    in a songless sky.

    Peter Britell -- The 700 Haiku of the Carpenter, 2014

    I like that haiku has become part of blue collar culture. I can see this in popular haiku. But there are also people who have taken up haiku more for the poetry itself; that is to say they have found poetry as a means of expression and a field of interest later in life. Peter Britell is a carpenter in New York State who took up haiku because he was inspired by it and found it to be a means of expression.

    Most poets in the U.S. are poet 'hobbyists' or poet 'amateurs'; by that I mean that they do not earn their living through poetry. When I say 'most' poets I mean over 80%, easily. Most people are poets in the way that most people who love cooking are cooks; very few cooks make their living by cooking, but it is often a means of creativity that people find satisfying. Or poets are like gardeners; gardeners cultivate the plant realm and poets cultivate the word realm.

    I often compare poetry to the craft of carpentry; carpenters shape wood and poets shape words. Britell first published a collection of 400 haiku; then over the years he published 500, 600, and finally the 700 haiku collection. Britell has a keen awareness of rhythm and uses it to shape his lines, particularly the second line which he likes to divide into two parts as in the quoted haiku. He explores these possible divisions of line two; sometimes breaking it up into 3 + 4, or 2 + 5, or 4 + 3, etc. His haiku lean towards what I call a 'plain style'; though now and then he will use devices like metaphor, simile, and personification. It's a collection that I've read several times and enjoyed each time I have opened it.
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  45. TopTop #54
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    Grandma knits a sock,
    grandpa's chair rocks, yet he sleeps;
    snow blocks the roadway.

    Jerri Spinelli - Borrowed Water, 1964

    I love the way end-rhyme is combined with internal rhyme in this haiku.
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  46. Gratitude expressed by 2 members:

  47. TopTop #55
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    Looking through Grandma's
    old photographs the children
    find only strangers.

    Elsie Jachowski - American Haiku, Vol. II, No. 2, 1964
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  48. Gratitude expressed by 3 members:

  49. TopTop #56
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    The light of dawn called --
    I heard the angels singing
    "Peace on Earth to all."

    Jim Wilson - December 2020
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  50. Gratitude expressed by 3 members:

  51. TopTop #57
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    Leaning on the sill
    And watching the bright moonlight
    Whiten the new snow.

    David Hoopes -- A Whisper of Snipe, 2015

    David Hoopes published a collection of haiku in the 70's, 'Alaska in Haiku'. He was a member of the Alaska Poetry Foundation that published an anthology of haiku also in the early 70's, 'Drops from the Great Dipper'. This anthology was entirely of Alaska haiku poets.

    Since then Hoopes has moved to Washington state. I have a special fondness for 'Alaska in Haiku' because it was the first collection of English Language Haiku I read when I was attending the University of Alaska, Fairbanks. So I was happy to see this second collection of haiku appear more than 30 years later.

    Hoopes has a knack for effortless rhyme, often internal rhyme. He doesn't use rhyme in most of his haiku, but when he does use rhyme it does with skill. The series bright / moonlight / whiten gives the haiku an attractive sonic dimension. I have a fondness for haiku that use techniques like rhyme, alliteration, and assonance to good effect.
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  52. Gratitude expressed by 3 members:

  53. TopTop #58
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    Inside there is tea
    to relieve the aching bones
    of old winter's chill

    Odin Hartshorn Halvorson -- Hart Haiku: Pieces of a Changing World, 2017

    Odin Halvorson is a local, Sebastopol, poet and writer. He published this collection of 103 haiku in 2017. Halvorson's haiku are skillfully constructed. He is adept at single sentence haiku (like this one), at two-part haiku, and at list haiku. He is also adept at the use of metaphor and then unpacking the metaphor in the rest of the haiku, like the following:

    All knowledge is snow
    upon the child's tongue, melting
    into the great whole.

    This haiku is one that has a lot of dimensions; sensual, philosophical, and metaphysical. Metaphor is a particularly good vehicle for condensing meanings and then having those meanings overflow beyond the haiku itself.

    It's a wonderful collection.
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  54. Gratitude expressed by 4 members:

  55. TopTop #59
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    on folded paper
    found in this volume of Blake --
    a single haiku

    Denis M. Garrison - Haiku Harvest 2001 - 2006, edited by Denis Garrison

    Denis Garrison, in the early 2000's, was active in publishing a number of haiku magazines, as well as a journal for English language tanka. (As an aside he was also involved with a magazine devoted to the Cinquain called 'Amaze'.) 'Haiku Harvest' is a complete anthology of all the haiku magazines published at that time. It's a big collection with numerous authors using a variety of techniques. Garrison, as an editor, had a spacious view of how to construct haiku in English; he took a neutral stance regarding the formal (5-7-5) vs. free verse approaches and published both. Unfortunately, he took a lot of flack for that, particularly from those advocating a free verse approach. Garrison speaks about this in several essays. For this, and other more personal reasons, Garrison dropped out of the English language haiku scene as well as having a public presence in poetry in general.

    I am grateful for all the work he did and his publishing of so many haiku poets; a lot of these poets were published for the first time in one of Garrison's journals.
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  56. Gratitude expressed by:

    M/M
  57. TopTop #60
    Jim Wilson's Avatar
    Jim Wilson
     

    Re: Haiku Habitat

    The least of breezes
    blows and the dry sky is filled
    with the voice of pines . . .

    Onitsura -- Translated by Harry Behn, Cricket Songs, 1964

    Onitsura is one of my favorite Japanese haiku poets. Onitsura was a disciple of Basho. From the little I have been able to find out about him, Onitsura was a Shinto Priest and that influence is apparent in many of his haiku. In general I have discovered that Shinto has a strong influence on Japanese haiku, but that influence tends to be overlooked in the West. Instead, Westerners tend to interpret Japanese haiku through a Buddhist lens, usually Zen Buddhism, sometimes Pure Land Buddhism.

    I can understand that. It is easier for Westerners to understand Buddhism than it is for them to understand Shinto. Buddhism has a founder, a clearly defined doctrine, a conversion ceremony (taking refuge), a vast corpus of holy scriptures; all of these things map easily onto what the West expects from a religion. In contrast, Shinto has no founder, no holy scriptures, no conversion ceremony, and no clearly defined set of ethical proscriptions (which is not to say it has no ethics). This makes it difficult for Westerners to spot the Shinto presence in Japanese haiku because the marks of Shinto presence are usually missed.

    Partly they are missed because translators tend to abstract Shinto terminology. For example, in a recent translation of a haiku by Buson, the translator used 'altar' for 'kamidana'. A kamidana is a specifically Shinto home altar; a Buddhist home altar is called a 'Butsudan'. 'Kami' is the Japanese word for what are venerated at Shinto Shrines (Jinja); it is a word difficult to translate and covers natural forces, awe inspiring presences like waterfalls and mountains, historical people who have become Kami (like the very popular Tenjin), ancestors, etc. A 'Kamidana' means 'place of the Kami' and is where Shinto practitioners hold home-centered ceremonies. It is true that a Kamidana is an 'altar', but by using that abstract term, instead of 'Shinto alter' or 'Kami altar', the reader remains unaware that Buson is specifically referring to Shinto spirituality. I am not well-versed in Japanese (certainly not fluent), so it takes a lot of time and work for me to tease out these kinds of linguistic translation difficulties. And I am not criticizing translators for using a more abstract noun for specifically Shinto terms. I think the logic of the translator is that very few western readers will understand the Shinto reference, so instead they choose a word that is abstractly spiritual to give a rough feeling to the reader in English.

    But the result is that the Shinto dimension of Japanese haiku is occluded. The Buson example I mentioned is not the only one; I have found others by Shiki, Basho, and many others. It is my hope that at some point in the future a scholar will focus on translating the haiku of Onitsura and draw out, perhaps in brief comments, or footnotes, the Shinto dimension.
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