by Jim Kacian on April 3, 2011
April, as you all know, is National Poetry Month. During April The Haiku Foundation announces its HaikuNow! Contest Winners, ships its Touchstone Book and Poem Awards to its winners, and, beginning in 2012, will sponsor activities on National Haiku Poetry Day, April 17. It’s also the month that spring becomes apparent to most of us in the Norther Hemisphere, and so the renewal of the cycle is uplifting and encouraging to us as well.
What is also true is that April has been the most important month for donations for the Foundation, a tradition we would like to maintain. To that end, an anonymous donor has stepped forward to help make it so. This donor has offered to double all contributions to the Foundation, without limit, through the end of the month. This means your $50 donation will be matched by his/her $100 donation, effectively tripling your contribution.
The Foundation has never had such an opportunity before, and we are eager to make the most of it, and hope you will be as well. We urge you to send cash, check or money order to the address on our Donate page, or use the Paypal button on that page (where you can use your credit card as well as funds from your Paypal account). The Foundation has many improvements and upgrades scheduled for this year, so please help us to keep it in good financial shape. Thank you for your continued support.
Jim Kacian
President
The Haiku Foundation
by Mark Harris on March 14, 2011
The Haiku Foundation presents the results of the inaugural Touchstone Awards. In September of last year, THF introduced the Touchstone Distinguished Book Awards, and two months later, the Touchstone Awards for Individual Poems. The Awards recognize notable achievement in the haiku genre. Works published during the award year were eligible for nomination. The recipients were selected by independent panels comprised of recognized authorities in the field.
The results are posted on our new Touchstone Archive page.
by admin on January 14, 2011
We’re pleased to announce the addition of a Haiku News area in our Forum.
This area consists of separate bulletin boards for Contests, Meetings and Other Gatherings, Journal Announcements, and Other Haiku News. These boards will supplement – and provide new information for – the more comprehensive Event Calendars. While the calendars are condensed, at-a-glance checklists, the bulletin boards provide a means by which you can let other poets know about new matters, as well as post reminders about approaching deadlines, etc.
To access the Haiku News area, click Forum in the main menu, then scroll to the bottom of the forum. See the Introduction topic in each board for details about submitting to that board. Hope to see you in the news!
Billie Wilson
by Jim Kacian on January 9, 2011
There are other places you can find a haiku a day, but none of those places will be quite like this. The Haiku Foundation announces Per Diem, a collection of haiku edited by Paul Pfleuger Jr. and Jack Galmitz. Every day a new haiku will be posted on our home page that will please and challenge your conceptions of what haiku are.
In their goal statement for Per Diem, Pfleuger and Galmitz say:
“Every effort has been made to present an array of haiku, so that the entire spectrum of the genre is represented. Our presentations will not be limited to English-language originals, but will include haiku in translation, so the broadest possible representation of the field is offered.” They go on to say ”Per Diem will include poems from the past and present, from different ethnic groups, from men and women, from the established and from the unknown, with high quality being the only standard we use for inclusion.”
Per Diem will offer each day a haiku/senryu that we trust will engage you, say in the way a dream remembered leaves an impression upon awakening or sometimes for the entire day, or, the way a thought or word hides beyond the borders of consciousness and for all your efforts resists memory, or, simply the way a scent, a sight, a room removes you to another time and place.
We welcome your submissions of other poets’ published haiku/senryu for future use. Please contact the edtitors directly: Paul Pfleuger at thf_DOT_paul_AT_gmail_DOT_com and Jack Galmitz at jgalmitz_AT_yahoo_DOT_com.
We hope that you’ll use our forum to share your comments on the Per Diem poems. Let us know what you think.
Jim Kacian
President
THF
by Dave Russo on January 6, 2011
We are pleased to announce the start of our second annual HaikuNow! contest today! Prizes will be awarded for English-language haiku in three categories: traditional, contemporary and innovative. Anyone is free to enter one unpublished haiku per category.
Please see the main HaikuNow! page for deadlines and other requirements. The winning poems from last year are available from the HaikuNow! Archive page.
Laura Sherman is our contest coordinator. Our two final judges are Jim Kacian and Jane Hirshfield. Many of you will know Jane from her poetry collections (After), her essays (Nine Gates, Entering the Mind of Poetry) and her translations (Ink Dark Moon, with Mariko Aratani).
We look forward to receiving your entries!
