Riverbed Haiku Summer 2008

On the first Monday of May, I picked up my new bicycle. I bought it with the intent of using it for transportation, so it is a road bike with a few additions (lights, fenders, rear rack and trunk-bag). I carefully loaded the trunk-bag with my lunch and a change of clothes and set out to work.

This wasn’t the first time I had made the 4.25 mile trip by bike. I had ridden most of last summer and a couple of times in April. However, relieved of the weight of a backpack on my shoulders, and with the smooth ride of a new machine being used for its intended purpose, I breathed deep and easy as I made my way down residential streets and, finally, a bike path along the busy semi-rural highway that leads to my office.

Along the way, and as the days went by (I rode rain or shine in May), I became aware of the morning routine of the herd of cattle that resides near the intersection of First and Windsor in Champaign. The mating dances of redwing blackbirds, sparrows, and various finches became a daily comedy routine.

Motorists whizzed past. Most were on cell phones, fiddling with their car stereos, or trying to weave through traffic to earn the distinction of being one car ahead of the others at the next stoplight. As for me, I peddled on.

The motorists, intent only on their destinations, were encouraged by their automobiles to find the fast route, take short cuts, speed up, turn the world around them into a blur. My bicycle invites me, just as haiku does, to slow down and notice the world around me – everything from the cattle and blackbirds to the headwinds and raindrops.

Modern man is so disconnected with nature that most of us feel the need to enclose ourselves in a climate-controlled box to travel nearly any distance. I invite you to take a few deep breaths, allow haiku – and your own feet – to reconnect you to the world around you.

Helen Buckingham was born in London, 1960, and now lives in Bristol, in the south-west of England. Her haiku and senryu have appeared regularly in journals such as Acorn, Mayfly, Modern Haiku, Roadrunner and The Heron's Nest. She was recently one of the poets featured in "A New Resonance: Emerging Voices in English-Language Haiku 5". Her work has also been placed in a number of awards, including The Basho Memorial, The Hackett, The Mainichi Daily News, The Snapshots Calendar and The Suruga Baika.

Deborah P Kolodji moderates the Southern California Haiku Study Group and has presented haiku workshops for mainstream poets. Her work has appeared in Modern Haiku, Frogpond, Acorn, Simply Haiku, Strange Horizons, Scifaikuest, and other places. A Leo, she leads many poetry lives including being the president of the Science Fiction Poetry Association and the editor of Amaze: The Cinquain Journal.

Jacek Margolak was born in Rzeszów in 1964. He lives in Kielce (POLAND) with his wife and two sons. He works as a print technologist. He has been interested in haiku and haiga since 2000 and now he is a member of two poetic groups writing haiku - "Haiku po polsku" and "Orient", and his poems have been published on the internet at The Heron's Nest, Mainichi Daily News, Haiku Harvest, Asahi Haikuist Network, Lishanu and haiga at World Haiku Association.

a small girl runs 
into her father's arms— 
St David's Day

the house where 
my dead friend lived— 
morning warmth

Matthew Paul has contributed haiku to journals in the United Kingdom and the United States for more than fifteen years, and many of these appear in his collection The Regulars (Snapshot Press, 2006). He is the reviews editor for Presence haiku magazine, and is co-writer/co-editor with John Barlow of Wing Beats: British Birds in Haiku (Snapshot Press, 2008). He lives and works in London and has a blog at: http://matthewpaulpoems.blogspot.com.

Jennifer Gomoll Popolis is a Chicago native currently living in Springfield, IL. Her haiku have appeared or are upcoming in Modern Haiku, bottle rockets, The Heron's Nest, and Frogpond.

John Soules was born and raised in Toronto and currently lives in Wingham. Ontario. He has been writing poetry most of his life but has only recently turned to haiku and tanka. He has had work accepted in Presence and Frogpond.

Richard Stevenson lives in Lethbridge, Alberta, and teaches at the local college. His most recent work includes a lyric/narrative collection, Wiser Pills (Frontenac House, Quartet 2008 series) and two forthcoming collections of haiku, senryu, zappai, and tanka: A Tidings of Magpies (Spotted Cow Press, 2008) and The Emerald Hour (with photos by Ellen McArthur, Ekstasis Editions, 2008).

Children’s Haiku from Around the World – A Haiku Primer, Dr. Angelee Deodhar, Editor
JAL Foundation
Tokyo, Japan 2007

As a poetic form, haiku has left its native Japan to find fertile ground in nearly every country and written language on Earth. This primer offers haiku written by children worldwide, translated from the native languages to English and Hindi so that this book can be used throughout India – and with Hindi and English speakers worldwide.

In her introduction, Dr. Deodhar stresses the importance of haiku: “With haiku we will learn not only to walk at a slower pace but we will get reconnected with nature and free ourselves from stress.” The book is meant to introduce haiku to children, giving them a selection of poems with which they can relate. She goes on to explain that “no particular definition of haiku has been followed as the original definition has now changed.” She further explains, “It is easy to learn something if there is joy in doing so, without being burdened by too many rules.”

Two essays then lead us to the haiku. The first, “Haiku – A Shaft of Sunlight in our Hearts” by Momoko Kuroda focuses on selections from the poems and the expression of experiences in the seldom heard child's voice. The second, “World Children’s Haiku” by Patricia Donegan and Kazuo Sato discusses technical aspects of haiku – what makes a haiku a haiku and not just a three-line poem. This essay does encourage use of the 5-7-5 syllabic format as a starting point for children, allowing them to later grow into free verse haiku.

Also useful is the glossary of haiku terms at the back of the book. For anyone who is new to haiku, or simply not surrounded constantly be the terms associated with it, this is a valuable quick-reference guide.

The haiku themselves are beautiful. They are each a window into a particular child’s life and culture. They are approachable even when written from half a world away. As you move from haiku to haiku, you find recurring themes written by children who will likely never meet: the ocean, rain, environmental concerns, grief, the joy of watching a simple bug …

I was further impressed by the approachability and universality of these haiku when my five-year-old niece picked up the book as I started this review. She began to read from the haiku – needing help with some of the words, of course. As she read, she smiled as she recognized life experiences she shares with these children, nodded her head in compassion at the haiku representing loss and loneliness, and giggled at the sudden humor that can be found after the kireji.

Even without my niece’s response to this book, I felt that it serves as a wonderful introduction to the haiku poetic form. The inclusion of so many examples gives the haiku instructor a treasure to choose examples from – examples that will relate directly to the young lives this book is meant to reach.

Essay

Teaching Haiku at Millikin University
by Dr. Randy Brooks

As a writer, editor, scholar and publisher of haiku since 1976, I have been an active member of the haiku community for over 30 years. Throughout these years, I have never ceased to be amazed by the blessings of this literary tradition. First, and foremost, there is the gift each haiku offers if you give it a full imagined reading—if you let yourself enter into its space of perceptions—if you are open to its insight and feel the emotional significance of its moment—if you let it touch your own life memories and associations—if you let it come alive and if you let yourself come alive while holding it in your heart and mind for a moment. Second, as you read more haiku and improve at the art of reading haiku, you become more aware of your surroundings and your own life’s significant feelings or events. You start noticing things that you missed before. You stop to fully feel and perceive the moments you are living. As some of my students say, when you immerse yourself in this tradition, you get your “haiku eyes” and begin seeing and feeling things you missed before. You become more fully aware of the value of being alive, and, being a human, you get the urge to record those moments of perception and insight as new haiku. Third, the haiku tradition is very social—it is inevitable that when a haiku touches us, we want to share our response with others, and when we write a haiku, a moment of significant perception, we are eager to offer the gift of that haiku to others for their enjoyment and response. When groups of people share their lives and insights through this way, they are drawn together into a community that values the art of reading and writing haiku.

Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, I had been teaching haiku as a unit within courses such as creative writing, modernist poetry, and even freshman composition. We would spend a week or two reading haiku in English and translations of Japanese haiku, and sometimes we would write and edit a few haiku before moving on to other units of study. My students loved reading and responding to haiku, and they immediately saw the value of learning to be more concise, as well as learning about the power of images in their writing. They enjoyed the idea that the reader is a co-creator of the significance when reading a haiku. But they never really understood the transactional blessings of being immersed in the haiku community, nor did they get enough engagement to fully understand the powerful integration of the art of reading and writing haiku. I realized that I needed to develop a program of haiku studies at Millikin University that would share the full blessings of this literary tradition with students.

In 1997 I received a full-year sabbatical to study the history of haiku in English, which resulted in the publication of the Global Haiku Anthology: 25 Outstanding Poets (co-edited with George Swede and published by Iron Press in 2000). In 1998 I was named the Hardy Distinguished Professor of English to continue my English language haiku scholarship and to develop a curriculum of haiku studies at Millikin University that would more fully engage students in the contemporary art of haiku and immerse undergraduate students into the contemporary haiku community.

As a result, I developed three levels of immersion in haiku studies at Millikin: (1) English 170 Haiku Writing Rountable, a haiku writing workshop; (2) English 340 Global Haiku Traditions, an in-depth course on writing and reading global haiku traditions; and (3) various advanced individualized research, editing, or creative writing honors projects. In both courses, certain pedagogical goals remain steadfast: (a) students will read and enjoy favorite haiku as gifts of being fully alive, (b) students will experience the co-creative process of integrating the art of reading with the art of writing haiku, (c) students will learn the history of haikai arts and haiku aesthetics, and (d) students will experience the social nature of haiku in collaborative teams as well as through direct contact with contemporary writers who are active in the international haiku community.

English 170 - Haiku Writing Roundtable. This class is a weekly one-credit workshop in which students read and write haiku from a variety of perspectives. The workshop introduces students to contemplation or meditation practices with an emphasis on a different principle of Zen aesthetics in Japanese arts each week. Students read contemporary Japanese and English haiku related to each aesthetic principle. The students also write haiku attempts each week related to the principle or based on a particular approach to contemplation. Examples of the practices and perspectives explored include: on the spot observations, haiku walks (ginko), Zazen meditation, western visualization, moments of consonance versus dissonance, and people watching (to write senryu). Early in the semester, the students work on the art of editing haiku, and each student establishes a haiku editing partnership to help edit their haiku attempts. I emphasize four key editing tasks. Roundtable students learn to: (1) cut unnecessary elements, (2) add more seasonal context or sensory images, (3) rearrange the images to better fit the order of perception, and (4) replace weak, abstract or explanatory words with sensory detail. The course concludes with a class haiku reading from student collections of best haiku. Students may take the Haiku Writing Roundtable more than once.

English 340 - Global Haiku Traditions. This is a three-credit junior-level course which fulfills a general education requirement at Millikin University in global studies or counts as an advanced studies in poetry class for English majors. In this course, students study the origins and history of haiku and related haikai arts, and they immerse themselves in the art of reading and the art of writing contemporary haiku. The course begins with extensive reading and response to books of selected haiku by contemporary Japanese and English haiku authors. As homework before most class periods, students write imagined responses to favorite haiku, and they write original haiku attempts based on a variety of perspectives. After getting a strong experiential sense of the art of reading and writing contemporary haiku, students explore the origins of haiku and the history of related Japanese haikai arts, such as renku, haiga, senryu, and haibun. Each student completes an individualized project deliberately connecting haiku with another art or area of expertise. It is evident from our study of the Japanese traditions that there is no great divide between the visual arts and literary arts, so students often explore an interesting mix of interests in their individualized projects. Each student writes an in-depth study of a contemporary haiku writer, based on extensive reading of their haiku publications as well as email exchanges or personal interviews. The best of these reader response essays are published online at the Millikin University Haiku web site http://www.millikin.edu/haiku. The traditions course concludes with a public haiku reading with students celebrating the best haiku from their individual collections. All students also select five to ten of their best haiku to submit to contemporary haiku magazines. Many of their haiku have been published in journals and subsequent haiku anthologies.

Throughout the two haiku courses, students select and respond to favorite haiku submitted to each other through anonymous kukai contests. Two approaches to kukai are used—traditional and matching contest. In traditional kukai, original haiku based on a particular approach or kigo (seasonal image) are submitted to the editor (me) who selects the best attempts for inclusion in the competition. These are placed on a page with no names, then students read and select a certain number of favorites. I often ask the students to write an imagined response to one or two favorites before the class meets to “give birth” to new haiku. During the kukai session, the students are directed to a favorite haiku which is read out loud and then all students talk about what they love about that haiku. Kukai is not an editing session, so edit suggestions or comments about why someone does not like a haiku are not allowed. The point of kukai is to find haiku that are loved. We say that when the haiku finds a reader who loves it, that is the moment it is born. And after everyone has talked about why they like that haiku, a vote is taken to determine how many students chose that haiku as a favorite. After the haiku is born, and only then, do we ask who wrote the haiku. When the newborn haiku is claimed by its author, we applaud (or snap fingers or tap pencils) to thank the writer for their gift. Then we look for another haiku waiting to be born. Authors of favorite haiku with the most votes receive awards of haiku books or recent issues of haiku magazines.

Matching contests work in a similar way—with the selection of matched pairs of anonymous haiku arranged in a tournament format. Each pair of haiku are discussed and fully appreciated, with one being voted on as the favorite between the two. The favorite haiku moves on to the next level of matched pairs in the contest until a grand champion is found. Then haiku authors are revealed so that all of the newborn haiku may be claimed by their creators. Many of the haiku in the upcoming Millikin University Haiku Anthology were first born in kukai and matching contests. If not, the editors declare that we are pleased to give birth to them by including them in this collection.

In addition to establishing a community of haiku readers and writers in my courses, I have sought to build connections between the Millikin haiku community and the broader contemporary haiku community. In 2000 Millikin hosted the “Global Haiku Festival” which brought about 80 of the leading contemporary haiku scholars, editors and writers to Millikin for a symposium on haiku as a global literary art. Lectures and readings on the history of haiku in France, Germany, United States, Eastern Europe and Japan were presented. Of course, there were also several opportunities for writing haiku together during a ginko, and sharing haiku through several public haiku readings. Millikin students participated in all of these events and interviewed many of the visiting poets. With growing interest in English-language tanka evident, the Tanka Society of America called a seminal meeting to form as a new organization that weekend at Millikin. Visiting haiku poets, editors and scholars often read or present workshops at Millikin, and so Millikin has become part of the international haiku community with scholars often citing Millikin student essays and editors routinely publishing student haiku.

In October 2008, the student publishing company at Millikin will publish the Millikin University Haiku Anthology, which is the natural consequence of an ongoing celebration of the art of reading and writing haiku at Millikin University over the last 10 years. The haiku in this forthcoming collection have been born as selected favorites by a variety of readers. First the student writer selected haiku attempts to be considered for competition, then the best of their attempts were placed into anonymous kukai, where students in classes selected favorites. At the end of each semester each student writer gathered his or her best haiku into a small collection to share with others. And at the end of each semester, I selected a few of the best of each student’s haiku to be added to the Millikin University Haiku web site. Editors of contemporary haiku journals and anthologies choose to publish some of the student haiku. And finally, the editors of the collection read through all of the known and submitted haiku by Millikin students and alumni to nominate about 1,800 possible haiku for the anthology. All nominated haiku were put into an anonymous alphabetical first-line order, then the editors had a final kukai for this anthology—seeking out those haiku that all four editors could say yes, this haiku needs to be in the Millikin University Haiku Anthology.

Teaching haiku has been a joy in my life, and I have continued to be blessed with the many gifts from my students as they discover and take up the joy of reading and writing haiku for themselves.

Dr. Randy Brooks
Chair of the English Department
Millikin University
Decatur, IL

June 6, 2008