The Haiku Foundation Forums

At Call of the Page we are considering a special online haiku workshop focusing on one line haiku (also known as monoku) later this year, if this interests you, please don't hesitate to contact Karen at: admin@callofthepage.org


Travelling the single line of haiku
http://area17.blogspot.com/2016/12/travelling-single-line-of-haiku-one.html



eye of the song a blackbird touching the void


Alan Summers
Winner, The British Haiku Society Awards 2018
Haiku Section judge: Scott Mason


Judge's commentary by Scott Mason:
"A Rubik's ku of perception and intuition held together with synaesthesia, the winning one-liner beguiles and haunts me. What and where is the "eye" of a blackbird's song? How does that eye "touch" the void? What void are we talking about here anyway – some nexus of negative color (blackness), sound (silence) and capability? ... the focus of Emerson's "transparent eyeball" turned inward? These questions and others draw me into a state of dreamlike reverie, impelled by a creature in equal parts totem and flesh. (The last "literary" bird to transport me like this was a thrush, in Burnt Norton.)"

Emerson's "transparent eyeball"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transparent_eyeball

Burnt Norton and the thrush
http://www.english.illinois.edu/Maps/poets/a_f/eliot/norton.htm

Burnt Norton (the first poem of T. S. Eliot's Four Quartets.):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burnt_Norton


"Stunning.  Wallace Stevens does come to mind--only you did it with one line. It's beautiful to read out loud and haunting." —Jo Balistreri USA

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Bones - journal for contemporary haiku no. 16
March 15th 2019
http://bonesjournal.com/no16/bones-16.pdf

One of my students has a number of haiku in there for the very first time! :-)

Wonderful work by our very own Marion Clarke! Her work in Bones is astonishing and there is more than one way to read the words and lines. Superb and powerful work!

Work by new THF member Ray Caligiuri as well; and John McManus!

And lots more!!!

Gabi Greve's various Kigo databases are still the best around, so a quick search showed this:
https://wkdkigodatabase03.blogspot.com/2007/03/willow-yanagi.html

Quote from: flowerfox on March 13, 2019, 11:24:38 AM
Just to ask if 'willow' on its own, within a verse, a seasonal word?

It's awesome how much she has covered around kigo and other aspects of Japanese haikai literature.

warm regards,
Alan

Thanks John, for saying such nice things about Bones journal, as it's still close to my heart as one of three original founders, along with Sheila and Johannes. :-)

One of my students just got four out of five haiku accepted, so she's over the moon! Also haibun journal emails have been winging their way, so more and more people should be hearing from them.

Congrats Rich re Bones! :-)

warm regards,
Alan

Booking is now open for Haiku at Slimbridge; a visit to the famous wildlife sanctuary in Gloucestershire, in the south west of England, where Call of the Page will be holding a haiku poetry workshop and ginko on April 6th 2019.

More information about the event at Slimbridge Wetland Centre: https://www.callofthepage.org/events/haiku-at-slimbridge/

2019 TLP HAIKU CHAPBOOK CONTEST
http://www.turtlelightpress.com/2019-haiku-chapbook-competition-guidelines/

I'm really excited about this haiku manuscript/collection contest! :-)
Looking forward to helping anyone with my Call of the Page hat too!

You have a wonderful judge in Susan Antolin, and I've personally met Rick Black who is a really nice guy and the winner will absolutely love working with him.

Alan

Tohta Kaneko, who fought in WWII, was a freedom-loving poet dedicated life to protesting against war ever since, until his late nineties when he died at 98 years old.

An expanded account of his life is being published later this year:
https://www.redmoonpress.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=308&osCsid=24a14fdcfb0ed3b9b4364c76c14b47db

He embraced gendai as well as the wildness of haikai verse style by Issa.

warm regards,
Alan

I've created a new essay about one-line haiku due to appear in a new bi-lingual anthology, but in the meantime, this feature has useful commentaries about monoku from both Yanty's Butterfly (Haiku Nook anthology) and invited guest poets:

Travelling the single line of haiku
http://area17.blogspot.com/2016/12/travelling-single-line-of-haiku-one.html


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Thanks Carol, I've just clicked that the review was helpful! :-)

When I had more time years ago I started going through authentic books of haiku, doing reviews, and it is easy to do a one or two line review, so inspired to do a few more. It really does help. So many people, including myself back in the 1990s, were tricked into buying something horribly done in both its physical appearance, as well as contents. The more quick reviews we can all do means more people won't have their good money wasted.

That's a good point Carol! I always love to read any introductory piece, be it preface, foreword, blurbs, introduction, as they often help us when reading the pieces as a whole.

And if you want to, maybe put in your informative commentary that you've posted here onto Amazon, maybe do that?
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Haiku-Days-Remembrance-Honor-Father/dp/1732502307/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1548929526&sr=8-1&keywords=Robert+Epstein+haiku

Just a thought! I try to leave mini-reviews when I can, as so many books aren't really haiku, and it must be a nightmare for anyone not a regular reader of haiku.

Alan

Quote from: flowerfox on January 30, 2019, 11:53:50 PM
Received the book, Haiku Days of Remembrance - Robert Epstein.

I know many people skip the beginning of a book and dive straight into the main pages, the poetry within this book are heartfelt and understandable, but please read the 'preface' this reading gives a deeper meaning to the poems.

Our senses bring memories flooding back of friends and family that have left us, after reading the preface and then this verse-

sundown
I listen harder
for birdsong
.
Robert Epstein

Wonderful.

Hi Carol,

I think Robert Epstein is the go-to guy for this topic, here's the current in print anthologies:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=Robert+Epstein+haiku

Alan

Quote from: flowerfox on January 24, 2019, 02:39:03 AM
I'm not new to the site, but would still like to enquire about a specific topic.

Could anyone recommend a modern or contemporary collection of haiku and related forms about death.
Yes, death poems. I would just like to read them for inspiration.

Thank you.

Read my President's report about "...haibun is on a trajectory as never before: It's now recognised and sought after in many literary publications."[/size]
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Enjoy the fine haibun!
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Alan Summers
President, United Haiku and Tanka Society

The 29th Nicholas A. Virgilio Memorial Haiku and Senryu Competition for Grades 7-12 is ready for your entries.


We are looking for the very best haiku—haiku that reveal your experience of nature or human nature.


Six winners will receive $100 each and the winning haiku will be published in Frogpond and on the Haiku Society of America website: http://www.hsa-haiku.org/virgilioawards/Virgilio-contest-guidelines.htm


Read the full submission guidelines, plus the stellar winning haiku from the past three decades, at the Haiku Society of America.

Just released!

inkblots revealing my story to the therapist
by Lori A Minor

"Lori A Minor is what I call a 'current' writer rather than just someone who is contemporary, it's bigger than that. Follow her work, and you can't go wrong, if you want the hidden pulse of the younger generation in society. It's not just squeezing the "breaks" for what they are worth, it's through blood and trial where she's forced herself through more than one glass ceiling.

Lori isn't just an important writer, and even that she's 'current': It's because we need poets and writers like her, we really do, who with heart, truth, bravery, and honesty, under fire, and to go that extra mile for all of us, whatever generation we represent. Lori has sheer raw decentness and her frontline bravery shines through. If you need to find permission to write, and "to be", look to Lori A Minor, who defies any institutionalised permission, or censure."

http://www.lulu.com/shop/lori-a-minor/inkblots-revealing-my-story-to-the-therapist/paperback/product-23943157.html

UPDATE!

Sold out for our first course, but happy to start a second group!