Concerning English Short Poetry

[Don Baird]

Hi onecloud,

"I consider this topic a non-debate" (onecloud).   

I do too.  But, I've always liked to theorize with Chibi.  He enjoys it and it causes me to ponder and often solidify what my outlooks/beliefs are regarding haiku.  My haiku always improve through the efforts of these chats. 

great seeing you here,

Don
:)

[chibi575]

Don, thanks for your reply. I've got to get your resources for Shiki.  Most of what I've explored is from the world wild web  ;D

onecloud, thank you for your reply.  I've heard of "micro poetry" and "micro poems".  I see you are a proponent of "practice makes perfect".  My tai chi sensei had a twist to that and took it one step further, he felt, "perfect practice makes perfect" and warned that flawed technique is much harder to correct than if you clear the technique at the beginning.  

Thirty years, I'm only in my eleven year or so.  Did you have a mentor or teacher, and if so, whom?  I am glad poetry has helped you along your path.  Do you have some particular element or set of elements you include in your poetry?

[onecloud]

Don,
yes, and thank you,

The first american haiku poet I read is Gary Snyder.

chibi,
perfect is perfect...
I didn't have a teacher to correct my form.

[cat]

Hello, Chibi,

I am so glad to see you say, "Perfect practice makes perfect."  I have been telling my students a variation of that ("Practice makes proficient, but only perfect practice makes perfect.") for years, and if I should happen to say it during a discussion in a faculty meeting, which I do when the occasion demands, I have colleagues who look at me as though I've just sprouted a second head.

On the flip side, as the daughter of a perfectionist father and having perfectionist tendencies myself, I've spent years trying to get away from the need to be "perfect" in every area of my life.  It's a losing game.  I take comfort in the fourth of the Four Agreements of Don Miguel Ruiz:

"Always do your best - Your best is going to change from moment to moment; it will be different when you are healthy as opposed to sick. Under any circumstance, simply do your best, and you will avoid self-judgment, self-abuse and regret."

How can we expect more of ourselves than that?

Okay, wandering waaaaay off-topic here.

cat

[Lorin]

how about we keep Haiku for the Japanese poets

and every non-Japanese i.e. foreign writer of the poems formally known as haiku
will now have to call their poetic efforts Forku

Forku is a compound taking the first part of "foreign" with "ku" tacked on as a suffix :P


col :)

This suggestion has potential! Since haiku written in other languages than our own are foreign,
and the Japanese already have a way of calling haiku in languages other than Japanese 'Forku',
every nation in the world could reserve the name 'Haiku' for their own haiku and refer to the haiku of other nations, including the Japanese, as 'Forku'.

Perhaps for diplomatic purposes the English spelling could be changed to the more phonetic 'Forkyu', though, so everyone would understand?

This would also work with particular groups or 'sects' in the haiku world. If my way of writing haiku is influenced by a different sense of poetics than yours, you could call it 'Forkyu', and vice versa.

My Haiku, your Forkyu...easy!

I think you've solved the problem of naming, Col.

- Lorin

[Don Baird]

Lorin,

I embrace your reasoning fully.   :o

:)

Don

[colin stewart jones]

lol lorin

but you write in Aussie English
does that make you foreign

so you do forkyu too ;D

col :)

[Don Baird]

That means AELH! for Lorin.  And Col, SELH for you!  This is a complex endeavor.   :P

Don

[Lorin]

lol lorin

but you write in Aussie English
does that make you foreign

so you do forkyu too ;D

col :)

Foreign to you, perhaps, Col. So you would be within your rights to say 'Forkyu' to my haiku, should you choose to do so, and I could say the same to yours, same as in all happy families.  8)

- Lorin

[chibi575]

Don,

Still exploring Shiki... What is yours (or anyone's) thoughts on "haiku" before Shiki?  It is confusing to me that Shiki's first encounter with Japanese short poetry was on portraits.  Were these poems extracted from "hakai no renga" as they seemed to be limited to 17 Japanese alphabetic letters (in any combination of words (in hiragana/katakana/kanji) based upon I suspect the hokku?  I do not think these were poems were really called haiku, because, I believe Shiki was to have coined the word/form later.

I also am discovering an aspect of Shiki's era that the ripples of Meiji reform/restoration threatened traditional Japanese literature especially those notions from the Tokugawa era and before.  Shiki was very concerned that poetry (such as tanka and haikai no renga) may be completely surpressed to the point of extenction!

Also, the works you sighted referes to Japanese short poem masters as haiku masters when in fact they were tanka, haikai no renga, senryu, and zappai teacher/masters.  The confusion, I feel, was the rather mistaken notion that haiku was already recognized as a literary form.  Bashou technically wrote no haiku, in fact, the elements of haiku were not defined prior to Shiki, as I believe the Japanese literature linage shows.

Shiki's strongest supported points for haiku:

haiku was real literature;
haiku must be grounded in reality; and
the prior masters must be replaced

(ref page 31, Masaoka Shiki: his life and works By Janine Beichman)

There will be more to explore...

Ciao... Chibi

[Don Baird]

Hi Chibi...

Yes... to my knowledge, there was no such thing as haiku (the word) prior to Shiki.  He apparently coined the word from hokku and haikai.  And, I agree ...  Basho didn't write haiku is how I understand it.  He would have never heard the word.

"Shiki was very concerned that poetry (such as tanka and haikai no renga) may be completely surpressed to the point of extenction!" chibi ...

     Very true, Chibi.  That was a driving force behind Shiki's life work.  However, it wasn't until a short time before his death that he began to delve into Tanka.  He was very apt at it and also wanted it to survive right along with his haiku. I suspect that if it weren't for Shiki, haiku (or haikai, rather) may not be written by anyone, including the Japanese, today.  Haikai was losing favor and position, it seems.

Interesting to note:  Western art was one of the primary influences to his writing including the very principle of "shasei". 

Enjoyable stuff. 

all my best,

Don