The Renku Sessions: Many Shapes – Week 2
Welcome to this renku session. I am Linda Papanicolaou and I’ll be your guide.
- SELECTION OF WAKIKU
Again, many thanks to everyone who submitted offers. So many ideas! I know this is a long-running renku group with many experienced writers but also newcomers. I am trying to avoid listing “rules,” which is often what people find confusing or off-putting about renku. There were a number of lovely verses that continued the imagery of the hokku with references to water, falls, mist, etc. Capping like this would have been fine for other forms like tanka or tan renga, but in longer renku we honor the hokku by not overtly repeating anything in it for the remainder of the poem. So unfortunately, I had to set these aside. They are, however, your pocket verses and can each be reworked into submittable haiku.
What I especially love about renku is how each new verse affects how we read the previous verse when we pair the two. These examples from the submissions, set with the hokku, may help to illustrate what this means and what my thought process has been:
stones on rocks
the many shapes
of the waterfall
Mike Barrett
rhododendron leaves
glisten with droplets
Scott Anderson
“Rhododendron” is a late Spring-early summer kigo. These woody plants like moist, well-drained soil and protection from full sunlight, so Scott’s verse brings in a plant topic and enlarges our visual image of the stream-side banks alongside the waterfall. Together, the pair of verses create a quiet scene that lets us linger and enjoy the coolness of the (implied) mist that condenses into droplets on the leaves.
…..
stones on rocks
the many shapes
of the waterfall
Mike Barrett
a child clutches
his mother’s collar
Orense Nicod
Orense’s offer follows the non-seasonal option for the wakiku while answering the “what else?” question by showing us a mother holding a child that is clinging to her. There is no actual mention of the waterfall but proximity and the linking implies it. I recall some years ago visiting Niagara Falls and feeling overwhelmed by so much water roaring down before me. Orense’s verse makes me vividly picture a viewing platform by a large, probably loud cataract that has terrified the child.
…..
stones on rocks
the many shapes
of the waterfall
Mike Barrett
kookaburras swoop in
the gum tree canopy
Valerie Green
Valerie’s submission extends the landscape space around the waterfall. Here, we’re craning our necks up from the view of the falls to see kookaburras flying through the branches of a eucalyptus forest. The verse addresses the “what else?” While also bringing a topic of its own—animals—to the renku
…..
stones on rocks
the many shapes
of the waterfall
Mike Barrett
a shire horse shoe
glistens on the anvil
Robert Kingston
This verse of Robert’s takes the non-seasonal option. It enlarges the landscape space by the waterfall by adding a blacksmith’s forge where a large draft horse is being shod. It’s a very different waterfall than Orense has given us—a gentler tumbling of water over stones, perhaps by a village weir or mill pond, and what was the waterfall sound of the hokku morphed into the rhythm of the farrier’s hammer on iron. The animal here is implied, and there’s also an implied person, though I’d probably categorize the verse’s topic as industry or technology.
I’ve thought long and hard about which to choose, each of which has its own implications for direction and pacing for our developing renku. I’ve decided to go with Robert’s shire horse at the smithy. Now, this may be a bit of a “rule-breaker.” Traditionally the wakiku is supposed to support the hokku without outshining it, but I think that may apply more to longer renku that have more time to pick up speed. For shorter renku we can come strongly out of the gate and have more of a shift between verses. Robert’s offer pairs very well with the hokku, I can vividly envision a rural landscape scene as if painted by the 19th century English artist John Constable—think of “The Hay Wain” in the National Gallery London. It picks up the hokku’s energy, positions it to be drawn upon by the next verse, and I think offers a lot of good options to everyone who will be submitting to our next verse.
So, this is our first side as it stands:
Side 1:
stones on rocks
the many shapes
of the waterfall
Mike Barrett
a shire horse shoe
glistens on the anvil
Robert Kingston
daisan: (3 lines): no season
- CALL FOR VERSE 3 – DAISAN
This, the third verse that completes our first side, will be three lines, non-season. For those of you who are primarily haiku writers and relatively new to renku, composing three lines without a cut can be an adjustment. The daisan is where we first encounter renku’s link/shift dynamic. Link to the previous verse–in this case the wakiku—while shifting away from the leap-over verse—in this case the hokku. To put it more simply, link only to the wakiku and repeat nothing from the hokku. The article that has helped me to understand this essential renku concept was Tadashi Kondo and William Higginson’s “Link and Shift: A Practical Guide to Renku Composition,” on their Renku Home website (http://www.2hweb.net/haikai/renku/index.html). John Carley also has an extensive discussion of linking and shifting in his Renku Reckoner (https://www.amazon.com/Renku-Reckoner-John-Carley/dp/0986976334).
Please use the submission box below to submit no more than two verses for the third verse, our daisan. Submissions will close on Monday, August 10 at midnight, eastern US time. Selection for the daisan and instructions for submissions for our fourth verse will appear here on Thursday, August 13.
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