re:Virals 570

“More difficult than making your own verses interesting is understanding those of others…” ―Shinkei (1406 –1475). Citing this, Onitsura (1661 – 1738) wrote: “…this should be a way in which a person is completely given over to training.”

Welcome to re:Virals, The Haiku Foundation’s weekly commentary feature on some of your favorites among the best contemporary haiku and senryu written in English. In the host chair today is Shawn Blair. This week’s poem, chosen by Jennifer Gurney is:

   
rocking rowboat
the slow pulse
of jellyfish
— Anne Fox
    Broomes Island, Maryland, USA
    Haiku Girl Summer, 11 July, 2026

Introducing this poem, Jennifer writes:

The imagery in Anne Fox’s poem is rich and pulls me in. The rhythm of the waves and the heartbeat of the jellyfish are mesmerizing. We’ve been watching a live cam of jellyfish in an aquarium in my fourth grade class this back-to-school week. It is helping us keep one foot in summer. This poem gives the same feeling. Also, there is so much left unsaid that it gently invites the reader in to sit a stretch on the dock and wonder. Lovely.

Host comment (Shawn):

I tend to associate rowboats with pastoral inland waters and courtship. In more than one 19th-century period film, a young man and woman find privacy in a rowboat while drifting on whatever slow current there happens to be.

But assuming the two parts of the verse present a coherent scene, that scene occurs on and in salt water. “Slow pulse” refers to the way jellyfish move through water. They have no brain, no heart, and consist almost entirely of water. In many ways they are barely distinguishable from their environment.

The occupant of the rowboat would surely be captivated by the sight of otherworldly jellyfish contracting themselves in order to move about, and the overlapping sensation of the rowboat rocking on the waves would both echo the motion of the jellyfish and anchor the overall experience in the familiar reality of nuts and bolts. The poet notices how other bodies move, and at the same time how one’s own human body is moving. The jellyfish and the poet are at the mercy of their environments, yet can through internal effort physically explore their environments as well. They are worlds of their own, aware and knowing, each in their own way: environments within environments. ¹

It’s natural to assume a coherent scene when we read a haiku with two parts, unless there is something in the verse that interrupts this tendency in the reader. Sometimes in the absence of interruption by design (though who knows what kind of subtle and magical prompting of the reader the poet is capable of) I choose to explore other ways that the words can be interpreted. In this case, it amuses me to retain my association of rowboats with Victorian courtship on rural freshwater bodies, where “the slow pulse” is of a human heart and there are no jellyfish other than those that inhabit the realms of simile and metaphor.

¹ From a scientific perspective, “organisms are internally heterogeneous open systems” (Richard Lewontin, The Triple Helix: Gene, Organism, and Environment).

Dan Campbell:

Thoughts About a Poem by Merman Dan

I distrust poems about the sea written by land creatures. Humans look across the waves and make them mean something about eternity, loneliness, death. The sea has enough to do without carrying such silly metaphors.

But this poem interests me.

The poet has noticed two movements, and that is the poem’s insight. The rowboat rocks. The jellyfish pulse. These are not the same motion. Rocking belongs to the surface, where wind whips up the water and the land creatures struggle to remain upright. A rowboat is forever answering what happens to it. Wave lifts it. Wave drops it. Weight shifts.

But a jellyfish pulses from within. I know this because I have spent countless tides swimming among them. Their bells tighten, loosen, tighten again. The movement is almost nothing. Yet that almost-nothing carries them through enormous distances.

Jellyfish have no brains, which humans seem to find astonishing. I find it more astonishing that a creature can move so gracefully through the world without ever having to think about where it is going.

I admire the poet for choosing “slow pulse.” Not swimming, not floating, not drifting. Pulse makes the jellyfish resemble a heart. Excellent. If I quarrel with the poem, it is only because slow is from a land creature perspective. To me the jellyfish is neither slow nor hurried. Its pulse is simply the correct measure of its existence.

The rowboat rocks because the sea moves it. The jellyfish pulses because it is alive.

As a poet, I would keep those three lines exactly as they are. As a merman, I will remain with the jellyfish.

Sitarama Seshu Maringanti:

This haiku presents an interesting comparison of a rocking rowboat and a jellyfish. While the solid rowboat’s buoyancy or stability is affected by the intensity of a storm in the high seas, the jellyfish faces no such crisis. The occupants of a rowboat face a life and death issue in a tottering boat unlike the jellyfish which is not affected because of its morphology. It has no heart nor does it have bones to give it a strong physical body. It is a virtually hollow creature and moves or propels itself forward in a fluid manner. The description of ‘slow pulse’ is appropriate considering the pulsating movements of the jellyfish.

Radhamani Sarma:

The images of a rocking rowboat and of jellyfish are subtly interconnected here.

From my school days, I recall a verse, “Row, row, row your boat…” something like that etc.

We witness someone rocking the rowboat, pulling backwards and forwards with the oars. The boat rocks with full force pushing through the powerful water and through the jellyfish. Unable to withstand the force of the boat’s movements, the jellyfish being hit lose their full surviving potential, hence the slow pulse, even reaching its final stage. The easily susceptible body structure cannot withstand such powerful forces.

There is a strong contrast between the first part (rocking rowboat) and second part (the slow pulse of jellyfish).

Alan Summers:

We use alliteration more and more in haiku, potentially overpowering the poem itself, which is so brief by design. Though rowboat and rocking do go together! Here rocking is suggested as a slow side-to-side motion of the little boat as it’s parked up, emphasised by doubling up of ‘slow’ for both the slow motion of the boat and the slow motion of jellyfish.

The seasonal marker for jellyfish in general is Summer, when they are around Planet Water in more abundant numbers. The haiku’s author, Anne Fox, is a nature photographer living on a tidal river (Broomes Island, Maryland, USA). Broomes Island jellyfish might more likely be mid-to-late Summer (July and August). Higher salt levels and long warm spells plus gentler river currents can bring jellyfish closer to local docks, piers, and shallow swimming areas. So we could say Anne Fox, plus jellyfish, is a seasonal marker due to their home location. It’s where Atlantic sea nettle (Chrysaora quinquecirrha) are the predominant stinging jellyfish in tidal tributaries and stretches of the Patuxent River near Broomes Island.

Rocking and pulse give us both movement, and sound, as if lending something aural to those seemingly silent and deadly jellies!

(Now which knot is making the boat secure? The standard and most common knot for securing a rowing boat is the Bowline, a secure non-slip loop; Excellent for dropping over a dock post or attaching quickly to a boat ring, as it will never jam under pressure and is easy to untie later. Or is it a Clove Hitch? They are handy for a quick, temporary tie-off to a vertical piling or post, easy to slip over the post, though it can shake loose if the water becomes choppy, so add a half-hitch lock for safety, and mind those jellyfish!)

Urszula Marciniak:

Farther and farther from shore, more and more peace.

Problems remain on land. As long as we don’t get seasick and there’s no shark nearby, we can calm down, even let our guard down.

Our hearts beat calmly. We paddle lazily, not thinking about planning our return. We become one with the jellyfish, who tolerate our presence in their world.

And then our minds begin to wonder. How deep can we dive to swim out? How far can we swim to return before dusk? Or will a storm break?

The bliss vanishes suddenly, but most importantly, it was there. We could experience it. Perhaps for the first time in a long time?

And the jellyfish still pulse slowly.

Sudha Devi Nayak:

The haiku draws an air of ineffable calm and peace with a boat rocking on placid waters, lapping waves and the rustle of wind. The sound of sibilance that rests ever so gently on your consciousness. Around are the diaphanous jellyfish reflecting the light of the sun with their pulsating contractions, slow and phlegmatic in the morning. Unwittingly it is a throwback to my childhood years when we chanted with gusto the nursery rhyme “Row, row, row a boat / gently down the stream / merrily merrily merrily / life is but an empty dream” especially on boat trips down the Ganga.

The haiku here is a perfect getaway from it all, embodying stillness in a world full of endless motion, cares and preoccupations. The boat can be drifting away for a while from a world that weighs too much on us, with the jellyfish for company, those marine wonders deftly navigating the waters through currents and seaweed. The translucent creatures symbolise the fluid nature of life that can transform any given moment, a surrender to the tide of events rather than resistance, a resilience that enables it to move entirely with the waters instead of against them, signifying survival through softness, patience and nonresistance. We see the Taoist concept of “Wu Wei”, an effortless alignment with the universe, moving through the vast sea with effortless, unforced action. We see the virtues of transparency, honesty, an awareness of our limitations, absolute clarity and emotional purity far from human hubris and malice.

The musings of Thoreau at Walden Pond and the desire of Yeats to build a small cabin in “the bee-loud glade” in “The Lake Isle of Innisfree”, where “peace comes dropping slow” speak of this. The contemporary American poet Wendell Berry writes “When despair grows in me / and I wake in the night at the least sound / in fear of what my life and children’s lives may be / I go and lie down where the wood drake / rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.” Thanks for this haiku of stillness and gravity and quiet happiness.

Carol Reynolds—under its calming spell:

It may sound clichéd to say this haiku returns me to my childhood, but I have proof in the form of a black and white, 3-1/2” x 2-1/2” photo preserved in my family album. It was taken in the early 1950’s at Yowie Bay, a pristine waterway south of Sydney, Australia.

My father’s uncle built a humble holiday cottage on the waterfront. The building is now heritage-listed. It nestles between two and three-storey waterfront mansions, reminding me of the children’s Golden Book, Walt Disney’s story of ‘The Little House’.

Interestingly the uncle married one of my mother’s aunts which considerably expanded family connections and generations of cousins. The photo shows a large wooden rowboat with nine adults and three children seated on board. One of those children was me. Back then children were well-drilled in the dangers around water and watercraft. I remember the strict instruction never to stand up in a boat. While this boat was large and quite stable, if that rule had been broken with so many passengers on board, it surely would have been a rocking rowboat.

When a group of us young’uns were allowed to mess around in the boat you would hear squeals of delight mixed with fearful shouts when family pranksters tested the boat’s stability by intentionally rocking it. I feel sure back in the day it would have been under the watchful eye of adults.

The boat was also used for fishing, a pastime that remains a favourite of mine. Such a restful pursuit, sitting in a boat that is rocking to the gentle rhythm of water lapping against the hull.

As children we would lean over the side and gaze down into the water to see what we could see. Often it would be jellyfish or jelly blubbers as we used to call them. Often, they appeared in large groups, their arms slowly pulsing in and out to move forward. Where had they come from and where were they going?

I am sure the image created by this haiku will resonate with any reader who has had the experience of being in, on or around boats and water. The more I read this haiku I find myself very much in the moment and come under its calming spell.

Author Anne Fox:

Thanks to Jen Gurney for choosing this and to Allyson Whipple and guest editor Kathryn P. Haydon of Haiku Girl Summer for originally publishing it.

The images of a rocking rowboat and the pulsing of jellyfish, common sights where I live, convey the sleepy feeling of life on a wide, tidal river. River time flows differently, more of seasons than of years. Nothing much has changed in our three generations of summering here. It is a place to slow down and breathe.

The gentle lapping of waves, the rise and fall of cicada song, the lack of traffic or city noise, the occasional clink of horseshoes or wind chimes in the distance, the repeating calls of morning doves… all combine to induce a hypnotic lull. This is the sensation I wanted to reproduce in a summer haiku.

Thanks to all who sent commentaries. As the contributor of the commentary reckoned best this week, Carol Reynolds has chosen next week’s poem, which you’ll find below. We invite you to write a commentary to it. It may be short, to a maximum of 500 words (succinctness will be valued);  academic, your personal response, spontaneous, or idiosyncratic. As long as it focuses on the verse presented, and with respect for the poet, all genuine reader reaction, criticism, and pertinent discussion is of value.   Out-takes are kept in the THF Archives.  Best of all, the chosen commentary’s author gets to pick the next poem.

Anyone can participate. Simply use the re:Virals commentary form below to enter your commentary on the new week’s poem (“Your text”) by the following Tuesday midnight, Eastern US Time Zone, and then press Submit to send your entry. The Submit button will not be available until Name, Email, and Place of Residence fields are filled in. We look forward to seeing your commentary and finding out about your favourite poems. Please note that commentaries must be your own personal work.

Poem for commentary:

     
robin on the fence—
are you the same bird I saw
when I was five?
—Robert Lowes, USA
    cattails, April 2024

Footnote:

Anne Fox is a nature photographer living moment to moment by the Patuxent River on the Western Shore of the Chesapeake Bay in Maryland, USA. Her haiku, senryu and haiga have been widely published in journals.

re:Virals is co-hosted by Shawn Blair, Melissa Dennison, Susan Yavaniski, and Keith Evetts (managing editor).

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