Book of the Week: Sun-Faced Haiku, Moon-Faced Haiku

Alan Gettis was, like so many that have been drawn to haiku in the West, a devotee of Zen and a practicing psychotherapist, and these related interests strongly mark his poetry. This chapbook (1982) is subtitled “Volume II,” indicating that it is his second chapbook (the first, Snowed In, also was published by High/Coo Press), and follows a similar format: translations of Japanese haiku, followed by a short gathering of original poems, from which our selections are chosen.

You can read the entire book in the THF Digital Library.

Do you have a chapbook published 2009 or earlier 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 Jim Kacian, following a concept first explored by Tom Clausen, and are used with permission.

                    removing shoes
before entering the zendo—
hole in my sock

zazen:
every now and then
silence breaks the noise

just breathing in
just breathing out—
this runny nose

breakfast
fourteen people
and no words.

today
even my fart
is silent

driving home
feeling close to satori,
a car cuts me off!