HAIKU DIALOGUE – Paradigm Shift – the dreams of mammals
Paradigm Shift with Guest Editor Craig Kittner
“Learn about pines from the pine,” Bashō advised.
Why do you think he said that?
Animism is a birthright of haiku.
However, western culture, despite all its scientific knowledge, tends to put human experience on some rarefied plane, separate and above all the other beings and forces of the universe. An ego-laden, anthropocentric attitude that would write off learning from the pine as anthropomorphism and personification.
How does this impact your writing?
Can you shift your perspective away from the human and dress yourself in the consciousness of another form?
next week’s theme: the intelligence of trees
To the tree, sun and shade are a problem to be solved. Its form, embodied memories of actions and reactions.
The deadline is midnight Eastern Daylight Time, Saturday July 03, 2021.
Please use the Haiku Dialogue submission form below to enter one or two original unpublished haiku inspired by the week’s theme, and then press Submit to send your entry.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.) With your poem, please include any special formatting requirements & your name as you would like it to appear in the column. A few haiku will be selected for commentary each week. 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.
below is Craig’s commentary for the dreams of mammals:
I wouldn’t say it was intentional, but this was probably the most challenging prompt I’ve ever proposed here.
While they often serve as inspiration for making art, it’s devilishly hard to convey the atmosphere and internal logic of dreams.
Our understanding of our own dreaming is limited, and the dreaming of other animals is shrouded in mystery.
As with many things in haiku, the most successful poems here keep it simple and allow the reader to expand on the experiences they present.
Pegasus
the horse and I share
flying dreamsLyntha Nelson
CO, USA
This haiku walloped my mind. I’ve never before considered the possibility that other animals dream of flying, though there is no reason why they wouldn’t. Then, there’s the idea that the dreaming of an animal like a horse – whose ancestors have communed with humans for many thousands of years – could be affected by human culture to the point of sharing some of our dream stuff. . . wow!
owl hoots
no eyes needed
to enter dreamsMary Vlooswyk
Calgary, CAN
How often we rely on the visual to express dreams and haiku. Consider how prevalent the word “imagery” is in descriptions of both. And yet sound is a powerful dream maker.
in the dream
more to it than I thought
autumn moonStephen A. Peters
Bellingham, Wa. USA
More to the moon, or more to the dream? What’s it mean to be truly in the dream? Perhaps it is more than a dream.
back into the krill distant song
martin gottlieb cohen
Egg Harbor, NJ U.S.
This haiku boldly draws us into the stuff of whale dreams. Wrapped in their song and the atmosphere of their feeding.
summer heat
the cat’s sleeping paw
grabs the airAlex Fyffe
United States
Dealing with animal dreams, the writer is tempted to make assumptions about what the creature is dreaming. By elegantly presenting the observation of a dreaming cat, Alex allows the reader to dwell on the possibilities themselves.
& here are the rest of the selections:
dusk –
asleep baby on the breast
dreams again the breastAljoša Vuković
Šibenik, Croatia
badger nails scrabbling
against the sett walls
hunter’s moonJohn Hawkhead
Wiltshire, UK
bones
beneath the lids of
sleeping dogsAlan Peat
Biddulph, United Kingdom
soft mew
catching fish
from his leaping dreamAnna Yin
Ontario, Canada
in a time capsule
to beyond time
who am I?Neera Kashyap
India
the bird
in the cage of my chest
set free — midnight musingमेरे सीने में
क़ैद पंछी — आज़ाद
मध्यरात्रि का स्वप्नTeji Sethi
India
deep blue
whales sing
their dreamsSubir Ningthouja
Imphal, India
twitching
legs without paws trauma dreamZdenka Mlinar
Hrvatska
he wakes
to drink
sheep flock across the pink shoreRichard Thomas
United Kingdom
fruit bats the stuff of upside down dreams
Olivier Schopfer
Geneva, Switzerland
pandemic
the mammal in me
dreams with open eyesPere Risteski
North Macedonia
dreaming of mother
an elephant calf
remembers her tusksTracy Davidson
Warwickshire, UK
in a moor
i stare into moments
deer eyesRicha Sharma
India
paralysis
on waking 畏怖 the fox scent
from a dreamsimonj
UK
counting
siblings and cousins
dreamless sheepRavi Kiran
Hyderabad, India
morning dream…
a butterfly flutters
on my noseNeena Singh
Chandigarh, India
old gray fox
the near dead weight
of his final dreamsLaurie Greer
Washington, DC
cat napping
the old mouser
still in pursuitBryan Rickert
Belleville, Illinois USA
suckling sounds
i let the sleeping dog
lieSarah Metzler
United States
sleeping in the beaver lodge wet dreams
Tim Cremin
Massachusetts
squirrel dream
my old dog’s paws
still youngAnn K. Schwader
Westminster, CO
whalesong–
a dream breeches
the surfacePippa Phillips
USA
midsummer dream
a wild yearling nuzzles
a human apeVictor Ortiz
Bellingham, WA
midnight dream
my dog’s paw
in my palmMinal Sarosh
Ahmedabad, India
his eyes fade
into dawn light…
beloved dogMadhuri Pillai
Australia
tremors and twitches
chasing the tail
of his dreamsOrense Nicod
Paris, France
serpentines
i’m above the fir trees
bird at lastMircea Moldovan
Romania
old dog—
fetching Frisbees
in the darkHelen Ogden
Pacific Grove
scooping up
a palmful of wild blossoms –
the silent squirrelMilan Rajkumar
India
only a colour
living multiple lives
in a timeless worldCristina Povero
Italy
childhood dream
again I am
the polar bearKath Abela Wilson
United States
sickle moon
the sleeping cat
curls her clawsKeith Evetts
Thames Ditton UK
dream of safety
the hedgehog
in a ballPaul Geiger
CA, USA
a mare nickers
in light sleep
brown-eyed moonBarrie Levine
Wenham MA USA
jungle dreams
I play hide-and-seek
with a tigerSushama Kapur
Pune, India
a dissonant phone rings
in my dream
a varied thrush answersPam Joy
Dyea, Alaska
winter rain
in my dream we’re young again
chasing wild rabbitsSusan Rogers
Los Angeles, CA
Craig Kittner has lived a lot of places. Fourteen at last count. He was reared, for a while, in Illinois. Then North Carolina. Providence saw the start of some interesting things that DC helped solidify. Now he lives kind of near the sea and is compelled to ramble and write.
Lori Zajkowski is the Post Manager for Haiku Dialogue. A novice haiku poet, she lives in New York City.
Managing Editor Katherine Munro lives in Whitehorse, Yukon Territory, and publishes under the name kjmunro. She is Membership Secretary for Haiku Canada, and her debut poetry collection is contractions (Red Moon Press, 2019). Find her at: kjmunro1560.wordpress.com.
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This Post Has 3 Comments
Comments are closed.
I can’t seem to get the submission form to submit my poems. Can you let me know if they actually did submit, or if there is a problem with the form? If so, I will try to submit again. Thanks!
Peggy B
They were submitted, Peggy.
bones
beneath the lids of
sleeping dogs
Alan Peat
Full of concrete content without entering the abstract, relying on a simple inference to connect bones and sleeping dogs.
Maybe better as one line, only because I don’t like the linebreak on of. Nevertheless my favourite below the salt.