HAIKU DIALOGUE – Island as Metaphor – No One is an Island
What an amazing venture into the world of surrealistic art once again – thanks to Guest Editor Lafcadio! Now we welcome back returning Guest Editor Marietta McGregor with new ways to look at islands… happy writing! kj
Island as Metaphor with Guest Editor Marietta McGregor
Islands in literature are often used as metaphors for isolation, escape, refuge and solitude. They can be places where our dream is to start anew, leaving behind trappings of a previous life and reinventing a whole new existence. Or they can be places of control, of imprisonment. We may think of Napoleon exiled to Elba, or the Birdman of Alcatraz. Islands have been used as lazarettos or prisons in far-flung lands such as the Venetian lagoon and in Tasmania. Islands also abound in mythology. The island of Ithaca was reputed to be Odysseus’s home. In their journeys, Odysseus and his men were beset by diverse perils, among them the Sirens whose unearthly songs tempted men to cast themselves to their deaths. To this day, a group of jagged rocky islets off the Amalfi coast, Li Galli, carry the name Sirenusas. Theseus abandoned the pregnant Ariadne on the Cycladic Island of Naxos, where she perished. Victorian literature, notably Robinson Crusoe, also features islands. These were tales of valour, self-sufficiency and survival against the odds, where a lone adventurer battles hostile islanders, bizarre creatures, hunger, isolation and exposure. Our bodies even have their own secret islands: the islets of Langerhans are clusters of endocrine cells within our pancreas that secrete vital hormones including insulin. We can think of the landscape of our brains in terms of islands of activity, areas where each of our senses is processed and interpreted.
prompt: No One is an Island
Do you think islands can represent our inner selves? Perhaps you have experienced a sense of isolation or separation that is almost like being on your own island. But as the saying goes, “No man is an island.” This week I’d like to invite you to write a haiku about a real or imaginary island experience you may have had, perhaps as it relates to a sense of connection or belonging. While haiku in English tend to avoid explicit metaphors and similes, a poem can by use of juxtaposition and imagery create metaphorical associations.
The deadline is midnight Eastern Daylight Time, Saturday, August 23, 2025.
Please use the Haiku Dialogue submission form below to enter one or two original unpublished haiku inspired by the week’s theme, and then press Submit to send your entry. (The Submit button will not be available until the Name, Email, and Place of Residence fields are filled in.) In the Poem box, with your poem(s), please include any special formatting requirements & your name & residence as you would like it to appear in the column. Please note that by submitting, you agree that your work may appear in the column – neither acknowledgment nor acceptance emails will be sent. All communication about the poems that are posted in the column will be added as blog comments.
Join us next week for Marietta’s selection of poems on the topic of No One is an Island…
Bios:
Guest editor Marietta McGregor is a retired Tasmanian botanist and journalist who has made her home between Canberra and the scenic south coast of New South Wales for over four decades. A lover of the natural world since childhood, she went on to study biological sciences, and has worked as palynologist, garden designer, science journalist, editor, university tutor, education manager, and grants developer for the national wildlife collection. Her haiku, haibun and haiga have been widely published, have won awards and appear in anthologies.
Assistant Editor Lafcadio, a former teacher, now works from home writing, editing and proofreading study guides for nursing textbooks. She lives in Tennessee. She has written poetry for a long time but a couple of years ago fell in love with Japanese micropoetry and hasn’t looked back. Lafcadio has been published in a number of journals and anthologies. She writes under the nom de plume of Lafcadio because nom de plume is so fun to say. You can read her poems on Twitter (X) @lafcadiopoetry or BlueSky @lafcadiobsky.
Assistant Editor Vandana Parashar is an associate editor of haikuKATHA and one of the editors of Poetry Pea and #FemkuMag. Her debut e-chapbook, I Am, was published by Title IX Press (now Moth Orchid Press) in 2019 and her second chapbook Alone, I Am Not, was published by Velvet Dusk Publishing in April 2022.
Lori Zajkowski is the Post Manager for Haiku Dialogue. She lives in New York City and enjoys reading and writing haiku.
Managing Editor Katherine Munro lives in Whitehorse, Yukon Territory, and publishes under the name kjmunro. She served as Membership Secretary for Haiku Canada for ten years, and her debut poetry collection is contractions (Red Moon Press, 2019). Find her at: kjmunro1560.wordpress.com.
Portrait by Laurel Parry
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Photo Credit:
Banner photo credit: Marietta McGregor
Haiku Dialogue offers a triweekly prompt for practicing your haiku. Posts appear each Wednesday with a prompt or a selection of poems from a previous week.
