The Haiku Foundation Forums

I think Don hit on something important when he wrote, "is haiku JUST poetry".  Early on in my haiku journey I noticed that haiku had dimensions that seemed unique.  When I read haiku (and later wrote them) I could experience other dimensions much as a person color-blind from birth might feel if they could suddenly see the full spectrum of color.  When I read about haiku and satori, I wondered if haiku had a spiritual dimension.  To help answer this question, I bought Haiku Mind by Patricia Donegan and Haiku the sacred art A Spritual Practice in three lines.  Both of these books were interesting, but I concluded that the spiritual aspect came from actually experiencing haiku and could not be created merely by talking about it. 

I think haiku has unique properties that set it apart from other literature.  Part of it for me has to do with the brevity of the form.  With few words to go on, the mind searches among them for meaning.  This allows haiku to slip beyond words to reach parts of us that are more primitive or preconscious and goes into places more conventional poetry and literature may be unable to access.

Another unique aspect of haiku is its use of ma space.  The reader steps into the poem and helps to interpret it rather than having all meaning neatly packaged and delivered whole.  The part of a reader that does the stepping in is often the highly intuitive part.  States of high intuition are often associated with spiritual phenomenon and visionary states.  Again, this seems to take it a bit beyond where ordinary language can go.  For me, haiku can be both poetic and religious because experiencing a fine haiku takes me to both places.  I also have a heightened sense when I read other good poetry, but it does not take me to the special places haiku can go.

I don't know if haiku can be considered just poetry.  I studied contemporary literature at a university and never saw a haiku.  To me this is sad.  Recently, I had some of my haiku accepted for publication in the Lakeview International Journal of Literature and Art, a journal that features many forms of literature and art.  Haiku can certainly hold its own with other forms of poetry, but there is a part of me that wants it to always have its own special place even as I contribute to placing it in the mainstream myself.

So in answer to the question posed by Jim Kacian I think I'd like to respond with Don's question: is haiku JUST poetry?  Yes it's poetry, but there's so much more to say and experience than the original question can contain.  Like many others here, I would like to see haiku take its rightful place as a unique art.  I would also say that part of haiku is atate of being.  Rebecca Drouilhet

Hi, Chase  The old Japanese masters did not shy away from personification, and when I go to Fay Aoyagi's Blue Willow Haiku World site I see that modern Japanese poets use it freely also.  Barrow asked for examples of personification.  I wrote a poem that used it that was fairly well received by poets on the forum.  The poem is:

waxing moon
the cicadas chant
my mantra

I've seen other examples of personification used here and there in EL haiku, but as you point out it is often frowned upon.  I think it's a bit silly that in the interest of perserving 'the real haiku' spirit, we've tried to become more Japanesey than the Japanese.

For me the litmus test when using personification is to see how it plays out in the poem.  If it makes the poem too precious or cute, I don't like it.  But there are many times when personification can work for me.  I think a good poet challenges the rules and strives not to become bound by narrow parameters.  So, Chase if you want to write about a 'sleepy moon'  I would do so and let the chips fall where they may.  Rebecca Drouilhet

Hi, Julie  My husband and I have entered about 4 or 5 contests, and entering was worth it as a learning experience. For example, we entered the Robert Speiss Memorial contest that invited writers to draw inspiration from one of Robert Speiss's speculations about haiku.  In the speculation chosen, Speiss advised writers to appeal to the senses and listed four of them.  We wrote haiku designed to stimulate all four senses named!  They were dreadful, but we did learn something by reading the winning entries.  Contests are fun, and they teach you about creative approaches and currently accepted standards.  My husband entered the British Snapshot Press calender competition, and his entry was chosen as one to be published in their 2013 calender.  I entered the Vancouver Cherry Blossom Festival Haiku International and won a Sakura award in the United States division.  We are relative newcomers when it comes to writing haiku, and our experiences prove that you can break in and become a winner even if you haven't been writing for years and years.  We and our local writing group also sponsored a haiku contest in our town.  I would strongly urge you to enter contests and submit your work to journals. Having your work affirmed by others can be a very positive experience.  Rebecca Drouilhet

under the clouds of imaginary numbers
fighting silently
against a monster

I like this one better although initially it was because of how I related it to my personal experience.  I had always been abysmal in mathematics, but several years ago I took a course in college algebra and surprised myself by making an  A.  I remember being fascinated by imaginary numbers and fighting the monster of fear of mathematics.  But to me, the poem spoke of a battle between good and evil.  Now that I have read the explaination about the reports of radioactivity, I still feel some of that sense even though the explaination casts a vastly different light on the poem.  I like Ban'ya's poem better because it speaks to me on an intuitive level.  Rebecca Drouilhet

Hello Chibi  I'm not sure if I fully understand your distinction between personal and private, but I will share with you some thoughts I've had about the subject.  I have lived for many years in an area that has a plethora of ghosts from the past.  Sometimes I move away from here, but I always come back.  Last year I took my grandchildren to visit the graves of their great-great-great-great grandparents. I wonder how many children get to do that?  When I write, I'm not sure how to share things that are highly local—especially those things that have deep roots in collective consciousness and perhaps collective guilt.  For example, there is a graveyard in this coastal area that is called by the inelegant name of Rotten Bayou Cemetery. The locals here report many supernatural experiences at Rotten Bayou.  The ghosts they report seeing are often described as having hideous small pox scars.  This is an area that had a large Native American population, many of whom died of smallpox.  Many of the residents here are of mixed Native American and European ancestory.  Recently, I wrote a haiku about Rotten Bayou Cemetery, but I didn't name the place in my poem or try to explain the complex hold it has on residents here who remain haunted by its specters after all these years.  I suppose I could write a haibun and take readers in that way, but I do wonder if outsiders would understand the nature of many of the private secrets I know about this place.  I am somewhat reluctant to erase the lines between personal and private for reasons even I don't understand. Yet I think many fine writers do have the gift of removing those barriers and sharing their local cultures and customs.  I'm not sure about my own reluctance, but your discussion topic does make me question things again.

Hello Alan,  Thanks for providing the information you shared about authorial comment.  My understanding of this is deepening, but I think I might still need some suggestions in the advanced mentoring section if I slip into this again.  It might take a little practice before I instantly recognize it.  I found your comments very clear and helpful, however.  Thanks for taking the time to help me clarify this.  Rebecca Drouilhet

Hi everyone,  I'm a newbie who has been writing some form of haiku for many years, but only in the last year and a half have I attempted to follow the experts advice.  I have a few questions about glossary terms.  First, I've been prounouncing senryu as send-you or sen-rey you.  Is this correct?  As I've worked in the advanced mentoring section, I have twice gotten the criticism that my poems are guilty of authorial comment.  Could you describe this and give an example or two to help further clarify this for me.  Another commentor said the ku in my poem showed closeness.  I think I understand what she meant, but I've read four how-to books about haiku that never mentioned this.  Maybe a glossary definition would help others.  Thanks for your time.  Rebecca Drouilhet

Alan, Only after I had time to consider it did I realize how rich your post had been.  In order to be alive, haiku must be practiced and read by living people.  Only as your life work tumbles through time will it be known by the people involved how it interfaces with them in their lives and literary work and the social fabric in general.  And, from what you wrote it certainly seems that there will be many lives affected.

Don, I followed your link, and I found the information in it powerful.  Some time ago my husband and I read a brief line that said some people (in Japan) even blamed haiku for WWII.  At the time, we found that a peculiar statement.  I had no inkling that such fierce battles had been waged over haiku, and I suppose over the idealogical and historical territory that different perspectives represented.  It's hard to believe people died for their art.  Alan's comments about the Japanese women also resonate.

John,  In our writers' group, we often get blank stares after we finish reading our haiku.  Someone will usually ask, "So, is that it?"  Still the group is proud to have us as members, and they often vocalize to us that they consider us their resident haiku experts.  This is commical to us, but here we are trying to become a little more expert.  I was also interested in your take on haiku and short poetry in general.  To me, haiku has special properties because, brief as they are haiku have both words and the spaces that allow for contemplation.  I admit I haven't read a lot of short poetry except haiku, but I do find interesting essays about incorporating haiku into the bulk of poetry. A dozen years ago, I took several literature classes at a local university.  None of them taught any haiku.  Why not?