Haiku Dialogue

HAIKU DIALOGUE – Surrealistic Art – “I and the Village” – long list

Surrealistic Art with Guest Editor Lafcadio

For the next few weeks I would like to be your docent in The Haiku Foundation museum. We will only have time to visit the surrealism gallery, which I’m sure will have enough inspiration for getting in touch with our subconscious mind and release its creative potential through the power of the irrational juxtaposition in these drawings and paintings.

First, we can discuss surrealism some to make sure we are all on the same page, or in the same room. Surrealism is an artistic movement that began in the early 20th century. Surrealistic painters created dreamlike and often inexplicable images. One of the major characteristics of this kind of painting is the comparison of unrelated entities and components. This creates a surprise for the viewer and hopefully carries them into a world of fantasy and symbolism. This technique of painting not only challenged traditional painting but was also a representation of the social and political upheavals of society after the trauma and disillusionment of World War I. Still, surrealistic painting is used today to transcend the boundaries of the ordinary and deliver us in the realm of extraordinary.

I can’t remember which came first for me…surrealistic poetry or surrealistic paintings. Either way I am firmly entrenched in surrealism and would love to see your responses to some of the surrealistic artwork. There is so much abstraction and symbolism in the drawings and paintings, I think there will be ample material to use in writing haiku and senryu.

Below is Lafcadio’s selection of poems on the topic of “I and the Village”:

ploughing
the stories of our ancestors
in upturned soil

Arvinder Kaur
Chandigarh India

 

clothespins
fenceless time
washing baby lambs

Marjorie Pezzoli
USA

 

brimful in the red . . .
crescendo of cooling cows
while she wipes her brow

(Late summer season word, kigo 季語: cooling cows, ushi hiyasu 牛冷す. Farmers cool their cows after working during a hot summer day. The kind care of farmers toward their animals, many considered as children of the house. Seasonless topic, muki 無季: red, koo 絳.)

Monica Kakkar
India

 

the dream
of my village
still but a dream

Mike Fainzilber
Rehovot, Israel

 

echo of laughter
in the empty home
tree rain

Daya Bhat
India

 

crossing the ancient packhorse bridge I step back in time

Nick T
Frome, Somerset, England

 

hometown visit
all the reasons I left
still remain

Bryan Rickert
Belleville, Illinois

 

village panchayat
the promises we make
to change the world

Mona Bedi
Delhi, India

 

russian bow hold
moving underground
her violin daempfer

Adele Evershed
Wilton, Connecticut

 

grandma at the window –
on the old village streets
just the wind carols

Dan C. Iulian
Romania

 

mothballs and Estée Lauder
remembering my mother and her mother
and her mother

Ella Aboutboul
West Sussex, UK

 

tender words
from our Charolais farmer
. . . each beast has a name

Ingrid Baluchi
North Macedonia

 

summer hay fields
by grandparents’ house
the shimmer of golden air

Jonathan English
Washington, D.C.

 

upside-down world
a goat’s bleat
sets it right

Rashmi VeSa
India

 

family reunion
a kaleidoscope
of memories

Valentina Ranaldi-Adams
Fairlawn, Ohio USA

 

a clutch of poppies
the bells tolling
for her youth

Archie G. Carlos
Minnesota

 

I and my village—
echoes of time ripple,
the sfumato of my dreams

Lakshman Bulusu
Princeton, NJ, USA

 

bambola –
sulla spalla nuda
solo la luna

doll –
on the bare shoulder
only the moon

Giuliana Ravaglia
Bologna (Italy)

 

memories unfold
in the eye of night
my origami dreams

Annie Wilson
Shropshire, UK

 

“why the long face?”
cubism ain’t so square
after all

Mark Gilbert
UK

 

frosted meadow—
his slurred words hang
in breathless clouds

C.X. Turner
UK

 

moving
through waves
on my way to church

(Some years ago when my family and I visited Oahu, I would attend Sunday Mass at St. Augustine’s church. Walking along the ocean on my way there, I was able to see its steeple dwarfed by all the hotels around it.)

madeleine kavanagh
United States

 

small town
the postmistress eyes
everyone’s business

Debbie Scheving
Bremerton, WA, USA

 

turned my house upside down
and found the sprig
I promised my cow

rob barkan
USA

 

childhood village
a pheasant colors
what I left

Cezar Ciobica
Romania

 

zigzags in the sky
all the jagged edges
of our grief

Susan Rogers
Los Angeles

 

trilling river frogs
swallow this village
& my dreams whole

kris moon kondo
Kiyokawa Village, Kanagawa Japan

 

my new city life
and in my dreams I gallop
through endless meadows

Urszula Marciniak
Poland

 

picture perfect
a mosaic of colours
what could have been

Jahnavi Gogoi
Ajax, Ontario, Canada

 

tear in time
at home a place
with many faces

Deborah Karl-Brandt
Germany

 

dead on the floor
roses and dollar bills float
from her monkey’s mouth

Pris Campbell
US

 

our gaze
against the banality
of goodness

Barbara Anna Gaiardoni
Verona – Italy

 

hooves caked with mud
tonight the cow stepped
over the moon

Orense Nicod
Paris, France

 

future tripping
I imagine my return
as a cat

Jenn Ryan-Jauregui
Tuscon, Arizona, USA

 

there in the home place
among the shouts and bleats
knowing all the names

Kathleeen Cain
Arvada, CO USA

 

dusty attic …
recalling things from my trunk
event by event

Milan Rajkumar
Imphal, India

 

shloka by shloka
the Bhagavad Gita
summer afternoon

Rupa Anand
New Delhi, India

 

Holocaust survived–
my mother still remembers
milking the blue cow

Lorraine Schein
Sunnyside, Queen, NY

 

painting cobblestones….
children begin hopscotching
into a rainbow

Marilyn Ward
Lincolnshire UK

 

face to face
with family secrets
a kaleidoscope

Eavonka Ettinger
Long Beach, CA

 

forgotten village…
who else to count
your autumns?

Steliana Cristina Voicu
Ploiesti, Romania

 

my green period…
the goat and I
locking eyes

Jackie Chou
United States

 

childhood-
in my dreams the sheep
also dreams

Ruth Happel
United States

 

her long blue skirt
the fisherman turns
to look again

Cindy Putnam Guentherman
Illinois, USA

 

a windy night –
the hamlet jacaranda trees
stripped of violet

Paul Callus
Malta

 

morning greetings
the neighbors volley
the day moon

Barrie Levine
Massachusetts, USA

 

do the neighbors know?
a boundary drawn
where the clover stops

Ash Evan Lippert
South Carolina, USA

 

butterflies you say
as if it were obvious
a headstone’s echo

john hawkhead
uk

 

my brushstroke…
blessed be the peasant girl

Sharon Ferrante
Florida, USA

 

grandma’s tale. . .
half-asleep we drift
into a green man’s world

Meera Rehm
UK

 

kaleidoscope
-in harmony
man and beast

Margaret Mahony
Australia

 

sycamore leaves
across empty streets
homeward

Eva Limbach
Deutschland

 

Chagall’s village
is my village ––
the geometry of nostalgia

Sheila Sondik
Bellingham, WA

 

Join us next week for Lafcadio’s commentary on additional poems…

 

Guest 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 Threads @lafcadio2.0

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.

The Haiku Foundation reminds you that participation in our offerings assumes respectful and appropriate behavior from all parties. Please see our Code of Conduct policy.

Please note that all poems & images appearing in Haiku Dialogue may not be used elsewhere without express permission – copyright is retained by the creators. Please see our Copyright Policies.

Photo Credits:

Banner photo credit: Lafcadio

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.

kjmunro

Comments (44)

  1. Dear Lafcadio, Ms. Munro, and Ms. Zajkowski,

    Greetings for National Native American Heritage Month! Congratulations to participating poets!

    Thank you for reviewing my submission. I appreciate the informative prompts and surrealistic artwork. I am delighted to be published in the Haiku Dialogue!

    I appreciate your sharing the kigo and muki. The World Kigo Database by Dr. Gabi Greve, Daruma Museum, Japan, is my primary almanac (saijiki) for kigo and muki, footnotes about kigo, and for translation of kigo and muki into English.

    Thank you for your consideration. Best wishes.

    Sincerely,

    Monica Kakkar (she/her/hers)
    https://www.linkedin.com/in/monicakakkar/

    1. I am so glad you add the kigo and explain it. It is definitely interesting to me and probably others. We are glad you participated!

  2. Thank you so much for the surreal theme and painting prompts dear Lafcadio! Enjoying each one of the poems last few weeks. Blessed to be included.
    Thanks to team Haiku Dialogue and The Haiku Foundation for this amazing feature.
    I loved this a lot especially in connection wIth my native village

    ploughing
    the stories of our ancestors
    in upturned soil

    Arvinder Kaur
    Chandigarh India

    1. That is one things I enjoyed this week was how the Chagall’s painting brought up so many memories of the poet’s own childhoods. Thank you for joining in!

  3. I would like to highlight, (for its strong emotionally empathic impact)

    forgotten village…
    who else to count
    your autumns?

    Steliana Cristina Voicu

    and

    morning greetings
    the neighbors volley
    the day moon

    Barrie Levine
    Massachusetts, USA

    (for a strong but delicate, visual of sharing)

    Ploiesti, Romania

    1. reposting as i accidentally cut the village from the I:

      I would like to highlight, (for its strong emotionally empathic impact)

      forgotten village…
      who else to count
      your autumns?

      Steliana Cristina Voicu
      Ploiesti, Romania

      and

      morning greetings
      the neighbors volley
      the day moon

      Barrie Levine
      Massachusetts, USA

      (for a strong but delicate, visual of sharing)

  4. Reading and rereading your list of selections, Lafcadio, is like attending a wonderful gallery tour of haiku/senryu poems. Coming from such a wide brush, the vast array and diverse pictorial of landscapes, still life’s and portraits…depict personal slices of each poet’s relationship to the parts of this cubist inspired, Chagall painting. While highlighting what they chose as a focal point, there’s no surprise, descriptive words such as ‘kaleidoscope’ turn up with such frequency!
    i love all the pieces that painstakingly has gone into this montage of yours, Lafcadio. What a great source of stimulation you have provided here at THF with your creative prompts. Thanks to all the poets moved to write, and the team that helps to make it happen, Kathy and Lori.

    1. It has indeed been a pleasure working on the prompts and reading all the poems. Thank you for your kind words!

  5. Lafcadio, I’m very grateful you have included me in such
    a unique presentation! All of your selections are excellent.
    Combining art (especially Chagall) and poetry was a special
    moment for me and everyone else I’m sure.

    And thank you Katherine and Lori for overseeing.

  6. Hi Lafcadio,
    I am grateful for the opportunity to admire the exquisite paintings and poetry on view here at Haiku Dialogue, these past weeks. I am delighted that my haiku was one of them. Thank you Lafcadio:) Thank you Kathy and Lori too!

    1. I love art, but delving into surreal art has been fun for me, too. You’re welcome, and thank you for submitting!

  7. Thank you Lafcadio for including my haiku. This was an interesting challenge. Loved all poems.

  8. Thank you very much, Editor Lafcadio, for selecting my haiku!
    Congratulations to everyone!

  9. face to face
    with family secrets
    a kaleidoscope
    .
    Eavonka Ettinger
    Long Beach, CA
    .
    kaleidoscope
    -in harmony
    man and beast
    .
    Margaret Mahony
    Australia
    .
    .family reunion
    a kaleidoscope
    of memories
    .
    Valentina Ranaldi-Adams
    Fairlawn, Ohio USA
    .
    I used the word “kaleidoscope” in my haiku. I was surprised that two
    other poets also used the word. However each of the three haiku is
    different in the concept that the haiku references. Diversity is
    infinite. Well-done to my fellow two haiku poets.

    1. Valentina! I agree with your comment about “kaleidoscope”. I was impressed by the use and now that you have put them together, they work so well as a “triptych”… I am not sure that is the official name for this stacking of 3 haiku. 🤗

    2. Yes kaleidoscope and mosiac were common descriptions. I think this speaks of Chagall’s style
      of combining everything in a random way that makes analyzing his art a joy. I did include three kaleidoscope poems because as you mentioned they were all about different features in the painting. Thank you for joining in!

    3. I’m so grateful to you for doing this, Valentina, because, like you, I was startled to find I wasn’t alone in my use of this wonderful word. It really helps to see them all together, and I’m honored to be amongst them.

  10. I am so impressed with these haiku and senryu about Chagall ‘s painting. I really was delighted by three poets (Valentina, Eavonka, and Margaret) using kaleidoscope and all so differently. It only proves that our lives influence our poetry and art influences our lives.
    Congrats to all the poets for such outstanding, thought-provoking poems. It is a joy to slip into the painting with fresh eyes. Thanks, KJ, Lori, and Lafcadio for all the work you do to keep the poetry coming. Happy thanksgiving to all whether you celebrate the day or not. I am thankful for all the haiku poets I have met, in person and online.

  11. Thanks Lafcadio for curating these surrealist collections over the last few weeks – a really interesting selection of ekphrastic prompts and fascinating to see how people responded!
    If contributors want to continue, do check out the dadakuku website edited by Petro C.K. Why not have a read there and maybe submit something.

    1. You’re welcome John and thank you for your thoughtful contributions! The responses were amazing. Yes we could mix our dada with our surrealism!

  12. Thank you so much, Lafcadio, for selecting my poem. This painting holds a lot of meaning to me on so many levels (my sister even used it in a winning science fair project). When I saw it at MoMA in my early 20s, I was quite overcome.

    I am so grateful to you for bringing these ekphrastic surrealist prompts and given such a bounty of information on each artist/the movement.

    Here was one of my favorites today:

    frosted meadow—
    his slurred words hang
    in breathless clouds

    C.X. Turner
    UK

    Luci has a way of painting with words.

    1. Thank you Eavonka. It’s been so fun to study paintings both with paint and with words. A good way to put it!

  14. Thank you Lafcadio for including my dadaesque (perhaps) effort in this thoughtful and heartfelt selection. Given the history of Chagall’s home town I would highlight Mike Fainzilber’s

    the dream
    of my village
    still but a dream

    1. You are welcome. I don’t know if it is dadaesque but it was certainly humorous. I enjoyed it! Mike’s poem was indeed excellent!

  15. Thank you Lafcadio for including my haiku in this selection.
    Please, can you edit my name. John Callus should read Paul Callus. Thank you.

    a windy night –
    the hamlet jacaranda trees
    stripped of violet

    (John) Paul Callus
    Malta

    1. Such a beautiful poem, John Paul! I did notify the administrators of my mistake once I noticed it. Sometimes when I copy the poem I paste things in the wrong place. I apologize and it will be corrected.

  16. Thank you very much Lafcadio for selecting my senryu for publication. This poem is very important to me, because there is often talk of the “banality of evil”, but there is a token goodness, a fake version of love ; far from being love, it is exploitation of other-than-self, and hence moralism.
    Thank you once again for your support!
    Best,
    Barbara Anna Gaiardoni

    1. I thought your poem was a very important one to share on our long list. Thank you for submitting!

  17. A very beautiful way to start my day. Lovely poems! So much to ponder! Congratulations to all the poets. Have a wonderful day, Everyone!
    🌸 Diana

  18. Thank-you so very much Lafcadio for selecting my haiku for publication. It adds a high
    note to my day. Thank-you also to Kathy, Lori, and the Haiku Foundation. Congrats to
    all the poets including the ones who were not selected.

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