Organizing your haiku

[Chase Gagnon]

Just the old fashioned way. go through em' one by one. Start with two large categories, then break each category down to smaller ones.

[Carl]

Hi
As a newbie to THF I was also struggling to organise my steadily growing scraps of haiku fragments and complete verses. I have scraps everywhere on my iPhone, on my ipad on my MacBook and in various notebooks. It was becoming unwieldy, cumbersome and I couldn't find what I needed.
Having considered all of the suggestions here I plumped for the following method using ipages on my MacBook. I had looked at all sorts of note taking apps for my ipad but none really seemed to offer what I needed. Plus my handwriting is atrocious and I can't read my own writing most of the time so record cards were out!
Firstly I set up a 'template' in ipages from an old music hall poster template available in the existing templates. It means I have an interesting olde worlde style page to look at when typing! The template is set up with a title field, notes about the haiku moment for referance in the future and then a table of 3 columns by 6 rows with a title row. This gives me space to put in a title explanation and then 18 little boxes to type in variants of the same haiku, changing words, punctuation etc to see which works best.
Using ipages means I can also have the thesaurus and dictionary to hand. I can also add notes in the margin if I want to explaining various things. I can also add photos I have taken or sketches drawn to the documents if required.
Each haiku or fragment (I seem to having a growing collection of two liners with no first or last line!) is on its own document. Documents are saved into files by month and then year. Using Search in the files it is easy to find keywords. Additional Tag keywords can be added to the document if necessary such as 'nature' or 'urban' if the haiku does not contain these words but I feel I need to be able to search by category.
The secret to any system is knowing it and sticking to it and being able to find what you want when you want. The latter is down to discipline which as any writer knows is the key to writing as well as as filing :0/
Hope this assists others in their search for filing systems for their haiku
Regards
C

[Jan Benson]

THF
Thanks for keeping this thread available ongoing for new members.

Organizing and tracking haiku is a headache we each have to deal with.

-- For me, the most vulnerable time shuffling the card system is pulling cards/haiku for submission, storing the in a tickler file or separate card file box, waiting for acceptance or rejection from an editor.
-- And the tendency to keep those few in circulation and parked in the temporary "home" as submission dates roll out over a season.

-- In a private workshop last summer, the monitor established a thread for Q and A on the topic of oranization and storage of haiku.
-- Two of the poets in our group use electronic fee-pay services that provide organizing tools/systems designed for poetry. Anyone can buy an annual subscription.

-- I am hesitant to trust a rental service to be maintained and serviced for viral bugs and hacks.
-- Is this phobia justified?
-- Has anyone here on these boards found the service flexible, yet "safe"?

Thanks,
Jan

[AlanSummers]

Hi Jan

I bought a portable hard drive, primarily for my photos and artwork so my laptop isn't slowed down, and use memory sticks for documents.  Memory sticks are small though, so a portable hard drive, mine is bright orange, might be useful to store word.docs etc...

THF
Thanks for keeping this thread available ongoing for new members.

Organizing and tracking haiku is a headache we each have to deal with.

-- For me, the most vulnerable time shuffling the card system is pulling cards/haiku for submission, storing the in a tickler file or separate card file box, waiting for acceptance or rejection from an editor.
-- And the tendency to keep those few in circulation and parked in the temporary "home" as submission dates roll out over a season.

-- In a private workshop last summer, the monitor established a thread for Q and A on the topic of oranization and storage of haiku.
-- Two of the poets in our group use electronic fee-pay services that provide organizing tools/systems designed for poetry. Anyone can buy an annual subscription.

-- I am hesitant to trust a rental service to be maintained and serviced for viral bugs and hacks.
-- Is this phobia justified?
-- Has anyone here on these boards found the service flexible, yet "safe"?

Thanks,
Jan

I have never heard of a haiku workshop leader suggesting a way to store participant's haiku for an annual fee. 

Could you message me privately?

There is Cloud, although I don't use it, so if you had a fire and everything was destroyed, it would be safe up there.   Alternatively if you get a memory stick with a strong keyring attachment, and the eye of the stick is metal, not plastic, keep the docs on that.  My keys always stay in my trouser pocket, never in a bowl by the door.   But plastic sticks tend to break, so a sturdy keyring attachment on the stick is advised.

warm regards,

Alan

[Jan Benson]

Alan, wow.
I did not really anticipate a reply on a thread as dated as this one.

Thank you for the advice on thumb drives and portable drives. The hardware is not really my dilemma. It is the digital method of tracking which haiku are "in process", "out for submission", and tracking both the rejections and acceptances.

Which leads us to the pay to use online server-ware offered by a few companies, and being used by poet's I know.

Please do not read the word "monitor" as a leader or master figure in the group. As it turns out, the monitor knows just enough about haiku to land her a job as editor of a regional publication, where all forms are considered for publication. The monitor is well published in most forms, but not so much haiku.
The format of participation was more along the lines of "the patients have over taken the asylum". But we made it work.

TMI?
Again, I was pleased to see the old threads are paid some attention on THF.

Jan in Texas.

[AlanSummers]

Hi Jan,

It's my pleasure to get round to answering, as well as my volunteer job (unpaid) to monitor every single message/thread.

This is an important thread as the more we start to get published the more complicated it is to keep track of the various aspects of record keeping.

I simply keep word.docs labelled Master Credits for published work; Free Haiku which can be very new or freed up work; Waiting which is submissions I am still waiting for a response.   

It is a lot of hard work to treble check everything but I can't see how a third party could assist me.  I have another word.doc which is for fragments and phrases that half a haiku.

If the time comes when a free haiku hasn't been accepted a few times, and over a large amount of time I can have that grace of time and distance, it may be amended/revised or switch for another fragment or phrase.

I have many different ways of writing, as well as styles in haiku, and those word.docs form the core alongside my Haiku Journal Notebooks that I designed, as I also regularly write longhand, with pen and paper, a very old method I know, but it has its uses. :-)

warm regards,

Alan

[PAllen]

wow! Fascinating thread.

I also keep my work on a thumb drive (as backup to my hard drive).
On each is a (master) Word.doc with every verse known to Phil.
Beneath each verse is a line/note/entry of who/what/where.

[Jan Benson]

---P Allen
---And Alan ----- Below the description of my current process ...

Let me state my method and ask if what I am doing is similar to yours.

On the Master word doc ... (Alan's "free" doc) ...
Each year I start a new document entitled year and Haiku
Like this ...
2015_Haiku

That is where I put any newborn ku, linear, down the page, one after the other.
I pull from those "ideas" (usually begun just a novice style haiku or senryu) when I am moved to rework it into sophistcation, and then insert the revision directly under the original ku.
--- If submitted, I make notes under the version as to publication and email sent to, then either "reject" or the publishers credits. Or, sometimes I have an epiphany and go back to update/revise the original version while it is fresh.

---When pressed for a deadline, I can usually pull something appropriate for the timbre of the publisher.
At the time I submit the completed ku, I create a word doc for that poem, or poems being submitted and name the doc first with the year it would be found in my yearly master docs, then as appropriate to the editors instruction the name of the publication (or shortcut name), time of year, then the word haiku or senryu or haibun etc, then my last name, as a courtesy to the editor.
___Example:___
2015_Presence_Winter_Haiku_Benson

Phew, does all of that compute?
P ALLEN... Is that close to how you work your Master doc?

ALAN, it seems that I need to add a working doc for submissions tracking, like your "Waiting" doc. As well, add a "Credits" doc for published ku.

---To maintain some semblance of continuity, I am thinking of keeping each as identified by year.

2015_Waiting or 2015_submissions.

---This would eliminate the confusion in my Master doc, trying to keep everything in one document.

This is good and I will contimplate it for 2016 work.

--- First question would be, in all of the cycles for submission seasons, how do you track specific haiku you may still have back in your "Free", or freed up doc?
Better said, how do you keep from inadvertently sending the same poem again to an editor, from a previous round of submissions.
Maybe you get rejected a lot less than me so this is not a potential problem?

---Regarding scraps of phrases, and word lists kept in categories,,, I need to digitize that, don't i.  Haha
2015_Haiku_scraps

Feed back welcome, 'cause I am sure I can't see around all of the corners in upgrading my so called system.

Jan in Texas

[AlanSummers]

Thanks Jan!

Amazing account of your process.  Glad this thread is alive and kicking!

[PAllen]

J-'n-T,

Wow! "Thorough" comes to mind. . .

When I rediscovered haiku and my fiscal potential I was "thorough;" but soon reality reared. . .

I have one document, and within is each verse (page-1 the latest penning/page-nn the earliest penning). Beneath any verse that has witnessed public accolade (or an editor's distain) is a note of who/what/where/when.

Verse-in-progress is edited on the 'notes app' on my iPhone; once I am satisfied the verse goes into my master-D.

I have a binder with print copies of correspondence of (un)successful submissions.

If there is an event I wish to submit to – I do a word search of the master document and copy into a new 'subission.doc' the potentials. Once choice(s) has been made I go back into the master-D, make a note and delete my 'submission.doc.'

That's it.

As you have described, your process is very close to my early days, but then I realized. . . too many files, too much overhead. I write because I am driven (as are all writers); I learned early that I am my best fan and prefer to keep my volume slim.

Sorry to be of little help. . .

Phil

[Jan Benson]

Alan --
Phil --
  -- Thank you both for spending precious time explaining your approaches to the "Master Document" theory and practice.

-- Phil
Having two approaches to this master doc method is valuable when weighing options for restructuring my own data base of haiku.
The single doc approach (Phil) is closer to what I have been using.

-- Alan
The multi-doc, in support of the Master Doc, has elements and concepts worthy of the massive production of a Master haijin.
-Those multi-docs keep the master doc from becoming a monster when searching (using the "find" option) for a haiku one wrote years ago.
-If it was published, searching the submissions doc is easier than the single master-doc that contains all of the poet's process.

-- Alan and Phil
In considering the restructure of my process, it becomes instantly clear that I move all of my annual Master Docs content to a single master doc.

-- Alan
Creating a document for leftover phrases and "favorite words" will keep me from scrambling through spiral binders, journals and stacks of napkins when processing rewrites.

Again, thank you both for detailed points in keeping the Master Document process.

Jan in Texas

[Anna]

I did not yet begin to start writing enough haiku to want to organise them but this thread has me inspired.

I think, initially as I learn terms, I want to use a telephone directory, the kind we write the names and phone numbers, so that it is an easy glossary.
The haiku, I want to maybe write ... in a notebook? With notes and carry in my handbag.
Why that instead of using the digital accessories?
Because the lead of the pencil makes music on paper, it talks,  even keys on the keyboard talk, but my fingers fly on the keyboard. When I write with a pencil, I tend to concentrate more, I brood more on the words, I look away and think deeper.  So this is how I choose to begin...( each time I type begin, I am typing in being, lol)

When I have a book of them, I will save them on a pendrive, like the others here. It will give me a chance to read and revise again. My guess is in another 10 years  :-[

[Jan Benson]

Anna,
Thanks for sharing your approach.

--Even before pushing my work out to editors, I created a master document, beginning in 2011. Each year a new master doc.

--In 2014-ish, after a mild brain trama, my motivation focused on pulling from these documents to get published; ego? Legacy? Not sure it matters; I needed to make the leap.

-- In those two years, I have maybe 40/50 haiku published. Doesn't sound like much to keep track of, but I began to look ahead at how complicated this is gonna be if I don't develope a broader view of my options.

-- Iam so glad for this opportunity to ask veterans how they work it, knowing they are juggling thousands of ku, partial ku, published ku.

-- As an aside, on your writing process:
I heartily concur there is value in scratching out ideas, phrases, haiku on paper with pen or pencil. Hence my comment regarding the pressing need to digitize my journal scribbles, napkin phrases, and spiral bound attempts. That "find option" in Word.doc will expedite the search for just the word, or phrase ...

-- Also, if you read Alan's 11/04/15 entry above, he too, values the experience of penning on paper (in journals, if I get his gestalt).

-- Your comment on your writing process, where you look away to better concentrate is interesting ...
In his TEDX video, Alan speaks of making that "lateral shift" in our daily life. An amazing concept, which leads the individual to the Zoka. Or so has been my experience.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LxLTiR7AKDE&sns=tw via @youtube


Jan in Texas

[AgnesEvaS]

I faced the same issue of having my work scattered in iPhone notes, separate txt, doc, and pages documents, as well as journals, haiku notebooks, emails, forums, and scraps of paper. 12 years of it! This past summer I had the gift of several weeks home by myself with no spouse or kids and decided to organize it all into a spreadsheet. For me an excel spreadsheet works best because individual cells are well suited to each carry a haiku and I am used to keeping extensive excel spreadsheets at the university where I work.  (Although I'm on a Mac so it's Numbers which is Mac's version of excel. Other than a few different functions and terminology it's the same thing.)

My columns include:
Workshop or submission status, Original Haiku, Edited version, Submission history, Source notes, and year.
I love that I can:
- have each haiku in its own little rectangle
- sort by year,
- associate the source (Poland vacation, NaHaiWriMo Facebook, Write Club @ library, etc)
- search by keyword (all haiku written about frogs, thunderstorms, or traffic, etc) in one place
- revisit the haiku and write a revision in the next column without losing the original
- see the submission history for each poem (like this: Acorn-rejected / Modern Haiku- rejected / Heron's Nest- published)
- copy published ones into their own sheet so my body of published work is also in one place but not separated from origins
- update endlessly without running out of space
- did I mention the ease of sorting!

Next project:
- adding a column for season
- starring/flagging more of the ones I want to rework in the status column
- ultimate: getting a first collection together for publishing, such as Alan recommended the Snapshot Press contest by March

Other tabs (or sheets) in the workbook include a log of published haiku with the name, issue, and date of publication; a collection of journals & contests to submit to sortable by deadline or submission open date as well as sub details/emails/urls/ and my own notes about typically accepted archetypes. I then mark if I've submitted to a particular cycle as well as marking each of the haiku in the sub batch in its Submission History column on the other tab/sheet.

I highly recommend excel for organizing haiku. Anything I write on the go on my phone, journal, scrap, I enter within the week into this master database.

[Jan Benson]

Thanks Agnes,
I knew you had developed a mega-sheet, but with my recent brain trama, could not envision such.
--- I have spreadsheets with publishers, addys, seasons they publish, notes about the editor, etc. But when my computer conked out last year, much of it was left only on my thumbdrive. Which I can take to the library when I have to access the old stuff. Some of it I have converted to my smartphone but it is frustrating to rely on that limited software pkg.
---The layout you have suggested, and my past use of spreadsheets in accounting as well as social work, I can see this works well for you.
--- like both Phil and Alan, there ultimately has to be a separate  document for one thing or another, which seems inevitable.
--- Q 4 U , do you keep up with favorite words or unused/partial phrases for future use?
Alan's method spoke to this.
Thanks for your detailed process.
Jan Benson