LL-L "Literature" 2007.08.02 (03) [E]

[Lowlands-L List]

L O W L A N D S - L  -  02 August 2007 - Volume 03

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From: Pat Reynolds <pat at caerlas.demon.co.uk>
Subject: LL-L "Resources" 2007.08.01 (04) [E]

In message
<57c981290708011334o5b0b5e09l738fe31348e027d0 at mail.gmail.com>,
Lowlands-L List <lowlands.list at gmail.com> (i.e. Tom Carty writes
>Below I post a coupl of my new poems: three Haikus. Tell me what you
>think.
>
>Come along with me
>Adventure awaits us now
>Beyond what we now see

The first line strikes me as 'throat-clearing' - which is possibly
self-indulgent in a haiku, where every last syllable has to earn its
living (well, it does in every poem, it's just in haiku that the
shirkers are really evident). One  syllable ('come') covers everything
you spend five on.

Compacting the three lines into two would give you space to  do a bit
more (I'm easy as to whether that's more about 'what we now see', more
about 'adventure', or more about the voyage....

Strictly (I think) the last line is a syllable too long.  I don't think
it needs the second 'now'. Unfortunately, I can't help recalling the
Lord Dunsany's 'beyond the fields we know'.

You have got me in the mood for writing poetry!

Cheers

Pat
--
Pat Reynolds

It may look messy now ...
        ... but just you come back in 500 years time (T. Pratchett).

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From: R. F. Hahn <sassisch at yahoo.com>
Subject: Literature

I go along with what Gabriele and Pat said.

I would like to add that I do appreciate the sentiments expressed in the
poems, but I would call them "poems in haiku meter" rather than "haiku."
They don't do the most important things haiku are supposed to do, and they
do what haiku are not supposed to do.  The 7-5-7 syllable scheme isn't all
that important and other schemes are often used (such as 4-5-4 or even
2-3-2).  Among other things, a haiku must do the following:

   - express the season by means of a "season expression" (季語 kigo),
   which may be a fairly direct reference (e.g., autumn, snow,
   chrysanthemum, frosted window pane, leaves on the pavement) or an indirect
   reference (e.g., children playing in a pool), though it's true that
   more and more non-Japanese haiku omit this,
   - imply momentary awareness of transience and temporariness as well as
   the assumption that human perception is delusion, these being key concepts
   of Zen (禅) and of Buddhism,
   - stay away from dualistic thinking and thus avoid value judgment and
   moralizing,
   - avoid the obvious use of metaphors,
   - create the impression that it is "incidental," even "careless,"
   sprang up spontaneously (like a "jotted" brush painting or calligraphy, or a
   flower thrown into a vase rather than carefully placed into it)--in other
   words, it should not show the labor involved in conceptualizing and
   executing it.

Writing haiku is very difficult.

Regards,
Reinhard/Ron
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