Book of the Week: My Own Rhythm: An Approach to Haiku by Ann Atwood

Ann is from California and has a successful career as a photographer, poet and children’s author. My Own Rhythm begins with an interesting introduction to the three great Japanese masters of haiku: Buson, the artist, Issa, the humanist, and Bashō, the mystic, as a way of understanding the true nature of haiku. She writes that “through imagining, through feeling, through intuition, each of us has the potential for achieving that state of mind which is the haiku moment.”

Ann’s moving photography and art are featured on the THF Gallery: Photo Haiku of Ann Atwood.

from the dark canoe
slipping home at dusk, the faint
sound of dipping wings

an ocean of clouds.
rowing home at evening,
the hurrying gulls

clouds shadow the stream—
a sunburst! and at my feet,
this sudden shining

primitive paintings . .
the wars, the scars, the glory on
the walls of the shell

You can read the entire book in the THF Digital Library and please share your favorite poem from the book with us.

Do you have a chapbook published in 2016 or earlier that you would like featured as a Book of the Week? Contact us for details. Haiku featured in the Book of the Week Archive are selected by THF Digital Librarian Dan Campbell and are used with permission.