The Renku Sessions: Many Shapes – Week 10
Welcome to this renku session. I am Linda Papanicolaou and I’ll be your guide.
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- LOOKING BACK THROUGH THE WHOLE RENKU:
With each call for a new verse, I’ve been posting just the previous two verses to help you focus on the specific linking and shifting situation. One comment that came in with the recent submissions asked if I would please post the entire renku. I haven’t done that in a while, and since we just ended the third side, it is about time for a look back, isn’t it? Here it is, verses 1 through 9:
Summer Shisan: Many Shapes
stones on rocks
the many shapes
of the waterfall
Mike Barrett
a shire horse shoe
glistens on the anvil
Robert Kingston
the long clang
of a solid ringer topped
with shouts of “what luck!”
Clysta Seney
———
first performance of a famous actor
in our provincial town
Urszula Marciniak
only one stoplight
between here
and the moon
Michael Henry Lee
swallows departing
fieldfares arriving
Andrew Shimield
———
a cool tattoo
on the back of the neck
of the boy in front
Marion Clarke
the totality
when he touches me
Pamela Garry
snow butterfly
on a clear winter day
beyond the rising
Madeleine Kavanaugh
- CHOICE OF VERSE 10
Once again, here is a not-so-short list, one offer from each participant, so you can see who else is here and how their thinking is going:
old photos shared
at the family reunion
Margaret Anderson
through a droplet
the world upside down
Scott Anderson
click, click, click
a roundabout route through trees
Stephanie Bauer
prayer flags
signal our arrival
Belinda Behne
milk and gasoline
go up again
Nancy Brady
my daughter asks what happens
when the sun has gone out
Marion Clarke
in a jeweler’s loupe
the deep blue of diamonds
John Daleiden
a flight
of impossible stairs
Tracy Davidson
letting loose in the war zone
an upcycled kite
Pamela Garry
shake roof cover on
the red barn frame
Valerie Green
the finger-printed lens
of his telescope
Laurie Greer
“Keep San Francisco Clean Week”
hangs over a street
Madeleine Kavanagh
sprinkling sugar
on her drizzle cake
Robert Kingston
the sky is falling and
the icecaps are melting
Michael Henry Lee
so many lives
on the thrift-shop rack
Laurinda Lind
her light tulle shawl still
smells of distant lands
Urszula Marciniak
every step down the slope
creaking
Biswajit Mishra
the preacher predicts
another doomsday
Sean Murphy
offer me a pebble
if not snow butterflies
Guliz Mutlu
are those armistice bells
in the distance?
Orense Nicod
sunshine scent
of washing on the line
Pauline O’Carolan
free fly for beauty
through the frost line
Zoltan Pachnik
a few cold beers
after the volksmarsch
Andrew Pineo
on the hill
the kite flyer runs out of string
Anton R-Kelian
surprised to see him
in this neighborhood
Christopher Seep
the cathedral bells
ring out over the city
Andrew Shimield
from a subway grate
whooshing warm air
Richard Straw
And again, there were several verses that linked very nicely to Madeleine’s snow butterflies. In addition, I was also looking for something else: how well a submission would set us up for the blossom verse that is coming next. The offer I have chosen is John Daleiden’s jeweler’s loupe. It carries on from the end of our ha, into our final kyu, using the techniques of both compare and contrast: from snow butterflies to diamonds, from looking up at things rising to looking down at precious stones on a jeweler’s bench, and from a very open image (“rising”) to one that is specific in detail. It also carries from the analogy of tiny blue diamonds to the anticipation of delicate pink or white petals, thus setting us up for the blossom verse. Here it is with its previous and leap-over verses:
the totality
when he touches me
Pamela Garry
snow butterfly
on a clear winter day
beyond the rising
Madeleine Kavanaugh
in a jeweler’s loupe
the deep blue of diamonds
John Daleiden
- CALL FOR VERSE 11:
This will be a three-line verse focused on the special topic of blossom.
The blossom verse, as a counterbalance to the moon verse, symbolizes the passage and fragility of human life. It is the most important spring reference, and a focal point of the poem. In traditional Japanese renku the requirement is that the verse is cherry blossom or possibly plum, though in modern forms and outside of Japan other spring-blooming trees including apple, apricot, hawthorn, or pear are admissible. Sometimes, when the arrangement of seasons requires it, you’ll see “FL.” or a flower verse substituted, but we’re going to allow cherry, plum, or any of the other above flowering trees. As always, link to the previous verse (the jeweler’s loupe) and shift away from the leap-over (snow butterflies).
Please use the submission box below to submit no more than two offers for verse 11. Submissions will close on Monday, October 5 at midnight, US Eastern time. Selection of the verse and instructions for submitting to verse 12 will appear here on the Thursday, October 8.
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