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Just wondering if your visual thinking predominated, which, as you astutely mention, is a left-handed attribute. There are several types of sinistrals (great word) . One type have their language centre mainly housed in the right brain - that's my type. So, thinking in both words and images is easier for me. Although, living in a left-brained culture does take the edge off a bit ^_^

Quote from: al fogel on August 30, 2011, 09:19:10 PM
Are you left handed, Al?

No, not in this life altho because of my belief in reincarnation, I believe that I was left-handed (artistic) in many lifetimes and also right-handed--but since right-handed predominates this time around, I'm probably more inclined to be less artistic than in other incarnations. But I'm glad I discovered haiku which (when successful) enables me to create less with more impact--probably a carryover from a left-handed /right brain branded prior life.

I'm happy for the residual carryover of creative artistic energy manifesting in the form of haiku/senryu poetry--no matter from what hand it issues forth.

Al   

Yes, I can follow all that, Al.

So, to clarify, haiku word's job is to transmit and maintain an evocation (and, magically, invocation?) in the mind's eye. Does that about sum it up? Furthermore, if the words exceed their function they get in the way of their transmission capabilities. They cause distracting dissonance. This is one of the chief reasons we keep the haiku words simple and transparent, I'd say. This visualisation process (right brain and deeper) seems difficult for many western peoples to grasp - possibly because we live in our heads (left brain) under the authority of scientific realism and its humanist spin. Once we conceive the haiku image (multi-sensory) the image informs us, as it did the writer of the haiku, in essence. Not the words. They show. The image does the telling.

Are you left handed, Al?

Quote from: al fogel on August 30, 2011, 07:33:14 PM
This 'feeling', you mention, does it come from the haiku image or the haiku words - or are these two distinct experiences, one haiku's verbal and the other haiku's iconic effect?

John: It's both. For me, the words trigger an image in my mind's eye which travels frrom the left brain logic to right brain feeling (or visa verse). It's so interrelated that the experience seems to occur simultaneously with the reading of the words.
A simple example: the pressing of various symbolic keys on my keyboard requires the coordination of three distinct but closely related bodies: the gross,(physical)  the subtle (pran, energy) and the mental (mind). In rapidfire succession and almost simultaneously, when my gross body is activated by the subtle (energy) & mental (mind) it presses the selective keys.

Simarily, when my gross eyes and brain are stimulated and energized by haiku words, it sends a selective message to both parts of the brain for either continued visualization (resonance) or discontinuance.

Hope this clarifies,

Al  

Question restated: What is a haiku's primary task, before all others? This would be to do with the minimalism of words (and all their devices). For example, what's the primary requirement (after parsing the words, of course) the reader is obliged to action in order to engage with this well known haiku? . . .

old pond
a frog jumps in
the sound of water

Basho

Quote from: nobodhi on August 30, 2011, 06:36:25 PM
by 'restrained language' i was referring to diction  ¿ yea ? ...

as to your question as to aim of haiku, perhaps you might please elaborate a bit on the question for me to hear it better

Hi nobodhi (good luck with that) ^_^

You talk about 'restrained language' in haiku. What would you say haiku uses its minimal language technique to achieve?


JP


quote author=nobodhi link=topic=1372.msg19027#msg19027 date=1314648201]
¿ ( may depend on how we spell spell ) ?

no doubt there are shamanic roots in haiku ...  ... 'tho i find its restrained  language of plainspeech and shibumi (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shibui) often astringent & dry ... as in a haijin's self-portrait

Quote
from behind he looks a bit cold

rather than incantory, vatic, etc

¿ ( may depend on the trance-laytion ) ?



[/quote]

Hi Al

This 'feeling', you mention, does it come from the haiku image or the haiku words - or are these two distinct experiences, one haiku's verbal and the other haiku's iconic effect? For example: Basho's world famous frog jump haiku; is it the words, or the image (when it kicks in) that we contemplate, would you say?


old pond
a frog jumps in
the sound of water

Basho



jp

Quote from: al fogel on August 29, 2011, 06:38:38 AM
Nice thread..

For me, all memorable ku  (whatever genre or style) casts a magical incantation that (like a great movie) transports me to another more mystical, magical world that sometimes children and child-like adults enter. The primal energy of joy. We must remember that what creates the magic are "words"--words that someone else created and that lead to fragments that lead to phrases that end in poems. The artist/poet's contribution is in the the manipulation and arrangment of words to build a magical feeling beyond the words and into the veins leading to the heart.

each erring points the way to hollows where veins await

my prose and one-line contribution to this most interesting thread ,

Al  

Hi David

Yes, bringing into conscious awareness the connectedness of all things and causes, especially the extraordinary nature of that which we have had decreed as 'ordinary'. Practising haiku allows this to happen, by default. It could be a covert DNA intiative? ^_^

Quote from: DavidGrayson on August 26, 2011, 02:32:35 AM
Hi haikurambler,

You note: "We are reminded that all around us is a mystery in process so vast and pressing that, when we gravitate back to our daily mundane tasks, it bugs us."

This reminds me of a short (four line) Robert Bly poem: "After Long Busyness"

I start out for a walk at last after weeks at the desk.
Moon gone, plowing underfoot, no stars; not a trace of light!
Suppose a horse were galloping toward me in this open field?
Every day I did not spend in solitude was wasted.

I've always loved this poem, and I think it underscores what you are pointing out.

However, I think a strength of haiku can be connecting the two: the mundane and the mysterious.

Best,
David

Hi, David

Yes, even the air we breath is magical. Thing about haiku, though, is it specifically generates an inner scenario, a virtual reality, and this to allow it to express its meaningful content as a direct experience to its reader. This is haiku's primary task, as we know, to let the haiku's circumscribed dream transmit its own meaning, without undue verbal interpretive bias. This use of language, unique to haiku and magic spells (et al: in the sense, for example, of mystic/magic path working http://goo.gl/7Su4V), simply enable this presentation of an inner diorama. How do you (and other members) respond to this focus?

jp

Quote from: DavidGrayson on August 26, 2011, 02:23:07 AM
Hi haikurambler,

I like the phrase "magic spell." From my perspective, what you describe is common to all literature and art. John Gardner described fiction as "dream," which I think is what you are pointing to. The haiku poet creates a world (or hints or implies a world) that the reader then inhabits. And because of the open-ended quality of haiku, that world can veer in many directions.

lingering snow
the game of catch continues
into the evening

Cor van den Heuvel (Baseball Haiku, p. 13)

Thanks for starting this discussion!

David

The best way to set the scenario, the backstory, for a haiku, so as not to compromise its methodology of
presenting a living experience, you know, rather than an epigramatical explanation, is haibun-at a stretch,
perhaps, a haiga. Or, is it? . . .



That certain feeling; the subtle thrill of a skein of light joy,
evoked by some refined delight or other -
you know, like, oh I don't know . . .
/
the leaf's ripple
in a puddle—
disappearing

jp



-
*pic by jp
Related Topic: http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/in-depth-haiku-free-discussion/if-we-tell-is-it-a-haiku/15/

Yes, Alan, ambiquity is a major tool in the ku universe. Either direct or implied. In fact, isn't life itself ambiguous? For a medium like haiku in particular, given its roots, this comes with the territory.

The best way to set the scenario, the backstory, for a haiku, so as not to compromise its methodology of presenting a living experience, you know, rather than an epigramatical explanation, is the haibun - at a stretch,  perhaps, a haiga. What do you (and other members, of course) reckon?

Quote from: Alan Summers on August 22, 2011, 03:41:22 PM
I'm also prone to liking haiku as anti-story, and that could be a good example of less Tell, more SdT and not SpIlT as in Show don't Tell and Spelling It all ouT.

Alan

Quote from: John McManus on August 22, 2011, 03:21:20 PM
Hi John, I'll admit you have a point about taking a ku for face value, after all that is what is so wonderful about the many interpretations one can make of a good haiku.

But I am curious as to what you or anyone else makes of this ku I posted earlier in the thread.


say it so it sounds like starling she says 

Chris Gordon

To me the only trace of external imagery in this poem is the mysterious woman.

To me this poem is a wonderful example of how haiku can act as an anti-story. We have nothing to guage the woman's mood, and no motive as to why she would want something said so it sounds like something else. But despite not having these things to help me understand what is going on, I still feel strangely pulled in and intrigued. I desperately want to know what is going on and why.

warmest,
John       

Hi, John.

Yes, there's many possible interpretations of a haiku (or other forms which require a right-brain visualisation as their a priori instrument of direct expression). However, these are stages we meet as we journey into any ku. The place we're looking to arrive at is, not the author's take, even, but the place beyond that where the original experience, as well as it may, is still ticking. When we get there we've arrived. [Beyond this we can travel, also. But, at this juncture we are entering the mystic by approaching the ku's archetyal source. So, that would be something else again - beyond the scope of this particular thread. Maybe here: http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/religio/haiku-as-magic-spell/msg18531/#msg18531]

Starlings are good mimics. I once spent a pleasant afternoon in a garden, you know, chilling out in the sun. On the roof of the garden's house a starling was, intermittently, speaking in English! Little snippets of this and that. Intrigued, during the course of the afternoon I amused myself by trying to get the bird to do a few words which I repeated, during gaps in its performance. After a short while it would pick up on my suggestions and give them a go. Adding them, no doubt, to its future repertoire.

On the basis of this interesting experience, I'm tempted to think that the mystery woman in this monostich (single line poem) is talking to a starling. ^_^ However, she's probably (perhaps ironically) asking her lover to say he loves her in the 'dulcet' tones of the bird in question. If this is so, I'd have chosen a goldfinch - hands down.

Quote from: John McManus on August 22, 2011, 03:21:20 PM
Hi John, I'll admit you have a point about taking a ku for face value, after all that is what is so wonderful about the many interpretations one can make of a good haiku.

But I am curious as to what you or anyone else makes of this ku I posted earlier in the thread.


say it so it sounds like starling she says  

Chris Gordon

To me the only trace of external imagery in this poem is the mysterious woman.

To me this poem is a wonderful example of how haiku can act as an anti-story. We have nothing to guage the woman's mood, and no motive as to why she would want something said so it sounds like something else. But despite not having these things to help me understand what is going on, I still feel strangely pulled in and intrigued. I desperately want to know what is going on and why.

warmest,
John        

Ha ha. Other than shamanic metamorphosis, you're probably going to maintain your present form for, hopefully, some time to come, Don. ^_^

Quote from: Don Baird on August 22, 2011, 02:15:16 PM
Hey John P.

As a side note, I'm hoping I don't become a hippo any time soon ... alive or dead!   ::) 

just saying ...

:)

ps ... I'm enjoying the thread!

We are in the unknown, the mystery of being. Lovely Issa lived in the wilderness of his soul, it is said, so that he could become the wilderness. Maybe he was into zoka by another name.


after the laughing
mushrooms kicked in—
address unknown

— Issa's phantom


-
http://haikuguy.com/issa/haiku.php?code=601.11a
(syllableº17 hits the nail on the head)

Hi, Sandra. Yes, them big words can obfuscate things no end. ^_^

This hippo ku brings two things to mind.

First, as a non-Japanese person and an English speaker (in this instance) we read what is presented in translation, as-is.

Second, if we find the material interesting, we can do some background research.

These two approaches will, of course, extend our experience of a particular piece.

Essentially, we will have our original response version and, also, the researched version. Line-blends of the two may occur. As time passes we will probably morph a unified version, one which synthesises all that we have garnered. We can cantinue adding to this along the way, if the spirit moves us.

This is why I stand fast on my original response to this hippo haiku. Whatever else is intended by its author is not (we are assured) included in the translation, nor any footnotes. All we can do, initially, is respond to the object at hand, as presented - ideally, with a suitably experienced haiku perception. We do this by 'seeing' the ku's virtual diorama, its inner movie. As in a dream.


PS
As for academia (and its possible abuse), use it all as a personal learning curve. But, never let it obfuscate your own authentic clarity and sincere self-expression. We all have our insights to share, as we travel the astonishing haiku way.

Quote from: sandra on August 21, 2011, 08:46:14 PM
Sorry, coming in late and harking back slightly.

Re the hippo haiku, Dr Gabi Greve's website has this to say about it:

桜散るあなたも河馬になりなさい　
sakura chiru anata mo kaba ni narinasai

falling cherry blossoms -
you also must become
a hippopotamus


This is a play on words.
When Japanese people die, their corpse becomes a "sleeping hippopotamus" (shi kabane) ... kaba ne, sleeping hippo.

Which adds to the intellectual feel of the poem.

PS: Thank you John for letting me feel that I might contribute in my very unacademic way to this discussion. It isn't always the case that I feel confident enough, with my lack of multi-syllable words, to do that.

Perhaps the idea of haiku being utilised as a prayer (as some suggest) is well possible, if that is the intent.

However, there seems a more compelling case for haiku to be understood more as a magic spell than a prayer (or even poetry). More precisely, not a full spell, though. Rather, half a magic spell.

What is meant by 'half a magic spell'?

The explanation goes like this:

In order to enjoy a little haiku movie; conjured, called fourth, or evoked by the words (the 'spell') of a haiku, we need, of course, to engage with the inner vision enshrined in, or accessed through, each haiku's verbal. However, it is suggested that we may enter the haiku's inner diorama and, if we so choose and are bold, wander about in it - aimlessly, or with purpose.

In essence -it is whispered- we can do an 'inner journey', or 'pathworking', with all that this implies. (Other uses may be left to the reader's muses and their discretion.)

So, at this stage of the game we have now entered the movie and are gone into a magic spell's universe- not the 'halfway only' invitation, which is simply to contemplate a little haiku movie. The standard haiku trip has now morphed into a whole other kettle of tadpoles.

Maybe we could call this, somewhat startling, notion: 'The Hidden Secret Of Haiku'.

I quite like this idea, at least in principal, and it does seem to have its own meta-logic to it, don't you agree?

Anyway, why not do a test drive and 'see' if it works? (But, for God's sake, don't eat any fairy food - you might not return for a year and a day!) . . .


old pond
a fog jumps in
the sound of water

— Basho



^_^


-
This topic follows through from a previous one (enantiodromia): http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/religio/haiku-as-prayer/

Perhaps the idea of haiku being utilised as a prayer is well possible, if that is the intent.

However, there seems a more compelling case for haiku to be understood more as a magic spell than a prayer (or even poetry). More precisely, not a full spell, though. Rather, half a magic spell.

What is meant by 'half a magic spell'?

The explanation goes like this: 

In order to enjoy a little haiku movie; conjured, called fourth, or evoked by the words (the 'spell') of a haiku, we need, of course, to engage with the inner vision enshrined in, or accessed through, each haiku's verbal. However, it is suggested that we may enter the haiku's inner diorama and, if we so choose and are bold, wander about in it - aimlessly, or with purpose.

In essence -it is whispered- we can do an 'inner journey', or 'pathworking', with all that this implies. (Other uses may be left to the reader's muses and their discretion.)

So, at this stage of the game we have now entered the movie and are gone into a magic spell's universe- not the 'halfway only' invitation, which is simply to contemplate a little haiku movie. The standard haiku trip has now morphed into a whole other kettle of tadpoles.

Maybe we could call this, somewhat startling, notion: 'The Hidden Secret Of Haiku'.

I quite like this idea, at least in principal, and it does seem to have its own meta-logic to it, don't you agree?

Anyway, why not do a test drive and 'see' if it works? (But, for God's sake, don't eat any fairy food - you might not return for a year and a day!) . . .


old pond
a fog jumps in
the sound of water

— Basho



^_^