The Haiku Foundation Forums

Hi Rebecca,

Thanks for sharing! I actually came across your poem in Modern Haiku, which of course I recently received in the mail.

I love the layers in the haiku, and what each reflects: the "ending" of the Israelites' residence in Egypt and the "beginning" of their journey in the desert. In terms of our own lives, Passover takes places in spring, a time in nature for new beginnings.

Finally, I like the use of "moon" since Passover begins at sundown.

- David 

I recently received in the mail the autumn issues of both Modern Haiku and Frogpond. I've noticed that in a typical issue of any haiku journal, there are usually poems about the topic of dying. This is no surprise––considering the centrality of death in our experience.

After reading through the two issues, these are the haiku and senryu that stayed with me:

From Frogpond 38:3:

funeral service
the comment of an infant
fills the church

- William Hart (p. 11)


coffin display
the various prices
of absence

funeral service so many dying flowers

- George Swede (p. 41)


From Modern Haiku 46.3:

Omaha Beach
the sound of wave
after wave

- Bill Kenney (p. 67)


Are there any death poems, or poems related to any aspect of dying, that you've written or come across recently?

As the Jewish high holidays approach, it's an opportune time to call attention to Jewish-related haiku being published today, especially haiku focused on the different facets of Judaism.

Not surprisingly, holidays are a common topic of Jewish-related haiku and senryu. Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement) is probably the holiest day on the Jewish calendar. The focus is on recognizing, reflecting, and addressing one's sins. As part of this, the observance calls for fasting for more than twenty-four hours:

day of atonement
the redeeming lightness
of being hungry

- Mel Goldberg (1)

Another Yom Kippur tradition is remembering loved ones who have passed away. This includes the lighting of a yahrzeit (memorial) candle. Even though we feel connected to the deceased through the act of remembering, we nevertheless feel a distance, or separation:

Yom Kippur
the memorial candle flickers
in its own world

- Bruce Ross (2)

The Bar Mitzvah is a well-known tradition, marking the transition from childhood to adulthood. Because the participants are teenagers (thirteen-year-olds), this can provide a window into changing social mores:

Bar Mitzvah
on top of his mohawk
a yarmulke

- David Grayson (3)

Not surprisingly, haiku with Jewish themes are diverse. However, even when they address subject matter that is not strictly religious, Judaism and its traditions sometimes remain in the background:

her 80th Passover
mother doesn't cook anymore
grandmother's tsimmes (4)

In the above poem, Zinovy Vayman fondly recalls his grandmother's version of a traditional Eastern European stew cooked on Passover.

The ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict has also been a topic of haiku poets. Here, too, religion is a presence in multiple ways:

Sea of Galilee
a white gull glides
peacefully   

- Rick Black (5)

Rick Black's haiku seems to be a simple description in the shasei tradition. Of course, the Sea of Galilee sits in the middle of the conflict zone. Beyond this contemporary reality, the sea is the setting for key events in the life of Jesus. 

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- Do any of these haiku resonate with you?
- Are there Jewish-oriented haiku that you'd like to share?
- Have you composed haiku that touch upon or reflect Judaism and its teachings? Or related teachings in Christianity or Islam? 
- Food and cooking are central to the experience of many cultures, and are often tied to religious events and holidays. Beyond Judaism, have you seen (or written) haiku that reflects this?

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Notes:

(1) Mel Goldberg, in The Sacred in Contemporary Haiku, ed. Robert Epstein (CreateSpace, 2014), p. 108.

(2) Bruce Ross, in The Sacred in Contemporary Haiku, ed. Robert Epstein, p. 195.

(3) David Grayson, in Hebrew Haiku Newsletter, 2005. Translated by David Grayson and John Kinory. 

(4) Zinovy Vayman, in Lishanu: An Interlingual Haikai Journal (Autumn 2005, Issue 1). http://xaiku.com/lishanu/01/haiku/vayman1.htm: Accessed September 6, 2015. Note: The original poem was published in Yiddish. 

(5) Rick Black. Cornell University Mann Library's Daily Haiku. http://haiku.mannlib.cornell.edu/category/author/rick-black/page/7/: Accessed September 6, 2015.

Hi Alan,

Thanks for sharing your thoughts and haiku. Each one of the haiku says something important and I enjoyed all of them.

My favorites (at first reading) ...

Kirkstone Pass
a sheepdog gathers
its part of the world
(each one of us is focused on our own "part of the world" ... very humbling)

Milky Way Train
I bring my inner child
down to earth

night of small colour

a part of the underworld

becomes one heron

I love the line "night of small colour"

I like your usage of the word "miracle" in describing our planet. Haiku, especially the shasei approach, really is about recognizing the "miracle" of life around us. 

Best,
David

The religious philosopher Jacob Needleman was asked in an interview: "When we question the meaning of life, you insist that we add the Earth to this query. Why is it important that we do so?"

He answered:
"One of the main aims of this book [Unknown World] is to see what it means for us that the Earth itself is a living being. Within a living organism everything that exists has a function, a role to play, in the whole of the life of which it is a part. Therefore, the meaning of human life is inseparable from the function that the human species is meant to serve as part of the living Earth. The central question of my book is: What, then, does the Earth really need from us?—far beyond the kind of efforts we are making to fix the environmental crisis we have created. Since everything human is part of the Earth, and is meant to play an essential role in the very evolution of the Earth—then everything human, including especially our inner and most inmost life, has an essential function within the life of the planet." (1)

Following the thread of Needleman's idea, I imagine that there would be two principal tasks for haiku poets. The first task is to simply describe the world as-is (the "organism").   

indian summer
the intersecting circles
of hawks

- Carolyn Hall (2)

Of course, this is the classic shasei approach, which Lee Gurga defines as the poet learning to simply "record what he or she sees, hears, smells, tastes, and touches." (3) 

A second task would be an attempt toward communion with the environment and all of its inhabitants:

at the fence
we tell our stories ...
the old horse and I

- Joan Vistain (4)

A central component of each of these tasks is communication. Citing the concept of quantum entanglement from physics, the poet Christian Wiman wrote that "if related particles react in similar or opposite ways even when separated by tremendous distances, then it is obvious that the whole world is alive and communicating in ways we do not fully understand. And we are part of that life, part of that communication ..." (5)

I'm curious about how other haiku poets view Needleman's idea of the meaning of life being inseparable from the function of our species as part of "the living Earth." Are there haiku that you've come across that reflect or embody this idea? Have you composed any haiku that do?


Notes:

(1) Jacob Needleman. Blog post: "Responding to Questions About An Unknown World," February 9, 2013. http://www.jacobneedleman.com/blog/?offset=1364933100000 (Accessed December 27, 2014).

(2) Carolyn Hall, Water Lines, ed. John Barlow (Liverpool: Snapshot Press, 2006), 29.

(3) Lee Gurga, Haiku: A Poet's Guide (Lincoln, Illinois: Modern Haiku Press, 2003), 133.

(4) Joan Vistain, Acorn: A Journal of Contemporary Haiku (Spring 2013), 38.

(5) Christian Wiman, My Bright Abyss: Meditation of a Modern Believer (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2013), 35. 

Hi Frederick,

Wow ... what a fantastic and ambitious endeavor.

Reading through some of these haiku, what strikes me is that these are very different from both "traditional" and "Gendai" haiku. Your Bible haiku are, at their heart, narrative. As a whole, they tell (or distill) a story; individually, each tells bits of the story.

While haiku are descriptive, the description is usually centered around a moment in time -- and tends not to focus on or adhere to the narrative (if any) that provides the greater context of that moment. Jim Kacian explains this in a well-known piece, "Haiku as Anti-Story," which I heartily recommend. http://www.gendaihaiku.com/kacian/anti-story.html

That being said, your haiku do possess a brevity and light touch that are characteristics of the form. Additionally, there is a key similarity in the intentional "incompleteness" of your haiku, which is similar to haiku generally, which rely on suggestion and implication. 

Thanks for sharing --

David Grayson

From Bob Spiess' A Year's Speculations on Haiku, here is the entry from November 7th:

"As it is generally accepted that in haiku creation 'ego per se' should not intrude itself, lest the nature of the now-moment of awareness be marred, it may be of interest for haiku poets to be cognizant that for some Sufis there is the view that Iblis (Satan, the Devil) was the first being to say 'I.'"

I think it is not so much the use of the word "I" but rather how the word is used, and the motive behind it, that is important. Sometimes the use of the first person form does not "mar" the moment but actually makes it more immediate and accessible—as in these poems by Sue Antolin and Fay Aoyagi:

and so I agree
not to die before she does—
the sound of crickets

- Sue Antolin (1)


long night
I distort the globe
with Photoshop

- Fay Aoyagi (2)


Both haiku are rooted in the first person experience and perspective, and their power derives from it. The presence of the ego is pronounced in both haiku—and is used to move beyond it.



Notes:

(1) Sue Antolin, Artichoke Season, pg 4.

(2) Fay Aoyagi, Moonlight Changing Direction (Two Autumns), pg. 13.

Al,

Very nice haiku. One association I have is water as the source of life. There's an interesting and complex interplay: inanimate stone, the face of the Buddha, and life-giving water. And the water not just on the statue, but filling and saturating the air.

I don't want to over analyze it – I enjoyed it in a straightforward way, too!

Thanks for sharing –

David     

Al,

Wow ... What a wonderful story. I love the haiku. Incidentally, it reminds me of one of my favorite haiku ... by Michael Dylan Welch:

toll booth lit for Christmas—
from my hand to hers
warm change 

Also, the backstory seems almost like a "found" haibun. I like the idea of using a story, article, snippet, etc. and responding to it with a haiku. I don't recall seeing this before!

Thanks for sharing.

David

Don and Vida - Thanks for the feedback; I appreciate it!

David

As usual, last Wednesday I walked from my office in downtown San Francisco to the BART (metro) station. The station manager announced that all trains were running 15 minutes late, due to an equipment failure. I braced myself for an overcrowded and miserable ride home. However, when my train arrived, it was miraculously empty. I wondered if some fluke of timing was the cause.

The next night, I had a conference call with a member of my company's tech team in India. He casually mentioned that about a third of the workers were out of the office, due to Krishna's birthday celebration. I realized that this was the reason my train was empty. We both laughed about the connection between Silicon Valley and India. Since then, I've read about the celebration: http://hinduism.about.com/od/festivalsholidays/a/janmashthami.htm.

Two haiku (in progress) that I've composed since last week:

eastbound train
carries the evening home
Janmashtami


Janmashtami
the emptiness
of the metro train

For the sake of convenience, I've created a table of contents for Religio: Religion and Haiku. Rather than scroll through two pages to locate a discussion of a specific topic, you can simply navigate from here.

Haiku and Religion: Introduction http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/index.php?topic=16.0

Haiku and Religious Concepts:
Unity http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/index.php?topic=17.0
Mystery http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/index.php?topic=157.0
Grace http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/index.php?topic=280.0

Haiku and Religious Practice:
Ritual http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/index.php?topic=1233.0
Haiku as Prayer http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/index.php?topic=694.0

Haiku and Religious Traditions:
Six Traditions, Six Poems http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/index.php?topic=436.0
Notes on Taoism and Haiku http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/index.php?topic=2075.0
Notes on the Shinto Tradition and Haiku http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/index.php?topic=2371.0
Buddhist Haiku http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/index.php?topic=958.0
Diwali Haiku http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/index.php?topic=1859.0

Other Topics:
Death Poems http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/index.php?topic=1490.0
The Living and the Dead (Halloween Haiku / Day of the Dead Haiku) http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/index.php?topic=1816.0
The Room Aflame http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/index.php?topic=991.0

Guest Posts ...

Gabi Greve:
Religion and season words in Japan http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/index.php?topic=463.0
Pilgrimages http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/index.php?topic=466.0
Religion and Nature http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/index.php?topic=465.0
Statues, paintings with religious motives http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/index.php?topic=462.0
Christian Celebrations in Japanese Kigo http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/index.php?topic=464.0

Gary Gach:
Haiku & Buddhism http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/index.php?topic=1396.0

Colin Stewart Jones:
A Sense of Something Bigger http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/index.php?topic=453.0

John P:
Haiku as Magic Spell http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/index.php?topic=1372.0
Is haiku still a stained glass window, nowadays? http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/index.php?topic=1356.0

In 1999, 83% of Japanese indicated that they followed Shintoism.(1) While it's not easy to disentangle the religious threads that have shaped haiku, it is possible to note key concepts that Shintoism and haiku share. As a starting point, I want to highlight five Shinto assumptions and beliefs that are reflected in haiku.

1. Shintoism is local - A characteristic of Shintoism is that it is locally focused. Kami are rooted in specific locales, as are the shrines dedicated to them, and their constituents.

2. Physical vs. spiritual - Shintoism does not draw a hard distinction between the physical world we inhabit and the spiritual world. A nice illustration are Torii gates, which mark the entrance to shrines. The gates, which are actually arches, often have no gate or fence -- marking the permeability between our world and the spirit world.

3. The natural world - Shintoism is grounded in the natural environment. Shrines are built in harmony with nature, usually built with natural materials and incorporating natural elements. Indeed, some "shrines" are natural landmarks like waterfalls and trees.

4. Seasonality - This is related to number three, but deserves to be called out. Festivals are tied to the seasons and to milestones in the farming calendar. Gabi Greve has compiled a saijiki of kigo for festivals and ceremonies: http://wkdfestivalsaijiki.blogspot.com/2007_01_01_archive.html.

5. Focus on the present - Shintoism is very much focused on the here and now.

..........

Shinto-inspired haiku abound; here are several that I've enjoyed:

on the trail of the gods ...
all creatures and spirits
blessed by hoarfrost

- Nozomi Sugiyama, from Seasons of the Gods (2)


flicking off water
a dragonfly quickly
becomes divine

- Hoshinaga Fumio (3)


there is no voice
in this waterfall in November --
Fudo Waterfall

- Shimomura Hiroshi, from the "Religion and Nature" Topic in Religio (4)


Having climbed Mt. Fuji,
My shadow stretches into
The form of a giant man

- Nobuyuki Yuasa, from Seasons of the Gods (5)


As mentioned above, Gabi Greve's Saijiki for Festivals and Ceremonies (http://wkdfestivalsaijiki.blogspot.com/2007_01_01_archive.html) is a good resource.  Do you have recommendations to share for good resources on Shintoism and haiku?

Have you composed, or read, any haiku that touch upon or reflect Shinto ideas?

What are your thoughts about the influence of Shinto traditions on haiku?

.......................

Notes:

(1) BBC Religions: Shintoism - http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/shinto/beliefs/religion.shtml. 76% indicated that they followed Buddhism. 

(2) Icebox - http://hailhaiku.wordpress.com/representative-haiku/

(3) Richard Gilbert, Poems of Consciousness (Winchester, VA: Red Moon Press, 2008), 167.

(4) "Religion and Nature" Topic in Religio, created by Gab Greve.  http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/index.php?topic=465.0

(5) Icebox - http://hailhaiku.wordpress.com/representative-haiku/

Hi Al and Seaview,

Al - I really enjoyed your poem.

Seaview - What struck me about your poem is that the comfort went both ways. You, too, were comforted by your father's hand.

David

Hi Gabi,

Greetings from a cold day in San Francisco!

Thank you so much for sharing the World Kigo Database page. I appreciate that you included wu-wei, which I alluded to in my post. And I love the photo ...

David