It’s Poetry Friday, this week hosted by the talented Carol Valsalona on her blog, Beyond Literacy. Make sure you stop by and check out what she has in store this week. Thank you, Carol.
Two weeks ago, Carol made a request:
Poetry Friday Friends:
If so inclined, please share a new image poem on the topic, Summer 2020 in the Midst of Quarantine Life, at your blog for the September 4, 2020 Poetry Friday that I am hosting. It will be a way to showcase the beauty of nature during trying times.
I have been celebrating the beauty of summer this week in my kitchen. With all the sun and rain in Syracuse, my generous neighbor’s garden has exploded with vegetables, especially tomatoes. It’s been a bright spot during the pandemic at my house.
I think this qualifies as an image that celebrates the beauty of nature, don’t you? I was indeed inundated, as the tomatoes were ripe and many could not wait to be cooked. Spaghetti and meat balls anyone?
Of course summer seems sweet partly because, at least where I live, it ends. I’ve been feeling nostalgic. A week of chilly weather, it seems as if summer never happened. This idea inspired this:
Enjoy your weekend. I haven’t mentioned here all the disturbing things that are going on in America, but my thoughts and prayers are with Black Lives Matter, with those who are ill, with the scientists who are working to defeat Covid, and with the Joe Biden campaign.
Be sure to visit Carol’s blog, Beyond Literacy!
If you want to know more about Poetry Friday, it’s here.
It’s Poetry Friday, today hosted by the amazing Laura Purdie Salas. Let’s see what she has in store for us this week. I hope everyone is well as we get through each new week which fly by. My thoughts are with all the teachers and students trying to get back to their important work.
Just for fun and interest I entered the 2020 Peggy Willis Lyles Haiku Contest, not that I thought I would ever win or place and did not. The winners were recently announced here, chosen from over 2,000 haiku entries. It was the eight annual contest run by The Heron’s Nest, an on-line haiku quarterly journal that welcomes submissions. In the above link, the editors shared the winning haiku and honorable mentions and described in detail why they are chosen. It’s well worth reading if you have an interest in haiku and it made me think about this popular form.
Though I write them on occasional I still know too little about haiku as an art form. I did know that classically, haiku is a three line poem originating in Japan with a 5-7-5 syllabic count, though some haiku poets veer from this. The number of syllables varies. I found the syllabic limitations useful and fun when I set out several years ago to create snapshots of historical figures, such as John Q. Addams, the first president to ever be photographed:
We could use someone interesting and innovative today, like you, JQ!
Classically, within the 17 syllable format, the haiku was often divided into two parts, that contrast in tone. An example given was this, written by Issa:
Look at the warbler-
he's wiping his muddy feet
all over the plum blossoms.
I think the shift in tone here is between the lovely image conjured by the warbler contrasting with his muddy feet on the plum blossoms.
Beside contrast in tone within the poem, the other classic haiku characteristic is the “kigo”, or seasonal word, which gives the reader a sense of, or course, the season. In the above haiku I see plum blossoms, a warbler, and mud . . . I guess spring.
According to Lowenstein, optimistic SPRING is often implied by “cherry blossoms and certain birds.
The bright exhausting SUMMER is implied by “flower and tree words.”
AUTUMN is “melancholy” and expressed images such as a “full moon, wind and dying leaves.”
Words like “snow” might signify a cold and difficult WINTER.
On The Heron’s Nest’s website submission page they post a list of qualities these contemporary editors look for when evaluating haiku. These do seem to take their cue from classic haiku.
Present moment magnified (immediacy of emotion)
Interpenetrating the source of inspiration (no space between observer and observed)
Simple, uncomplicated images
Common language
Finding the extraordinary in “ordinary” things
Implication through objective presentation, not explanation: appeal to intuition, not intellect
Human presence is fine if presented as an archetypical, harmonious part of nature (human nature should blend in with the rest of nature rather than dominate the forefront)
Humor is fine, if in keeping with “karumi” (lightness) – nothing overly clever, cynical, comic, or raucous
Musical sensitivity to language (effective use of rhythm and lyricism)
Feeling of a particular place within the cycle of seasons
So much to think about in writing such a brief poem. Haiku can feel to me to be inscrutable, though fascinating and worth the effort. Here are a few from the Japanese masters:
On a withered branch
a crow has settled.
Nightfall in autumn.
Bashō (1644-94)
Wandering through a stream
in summer, carrying my sandals.
How delightful!
Buson (1715-83)
Is that crow tilling
the field or just
walking around there?
Issa (1762-1826)
After I'm dead, tell people
I was a persimmon eater
who also loved haiku.
Shiki (1867-1902)
I hope you liked these. Have a great day and take time off from our troubled world, perhaps, and write a few haiku. Maybe it will provide a small respite.
Poetry Friday is hosted today by Elizabeth Steinglass. Make sure you stop by and read her amazing poem about the word “and.” It’s truly brilliant!
It’s getting closer to Christmas. I’ve been knitting rather furiously.
However, this gives me an excuse to watch the impeachment hearings and ignore all else. Though everyone says that most citizens are bored, I have found it fascinating.
I’ve especially enjoyed hearing the many very smart, reasonable, women representatives doing their duty.
So I listen and knit and use the mute button if there is too much yelling.
When I was a student at Vermont College I began to experiment with writing poetry on non-fiction topics. One project was to write a haiku about each American president. I wanted to find a “snapshot” of each life, something about them that interested me. Some snapshots were about small things, like John Quincy Adams’ skinny dipping. Other facts were about momentous things. Each haiku would be accompanied with a few factoids. What I ended up with was a mini-American history, of sorts, in snapshots, in haiku.
I will share the one I wrote about Andrew Johnson, the 17th president (1865-1869), who was the first President to be impeached.
Andrew Johnson
As a nation mourned
A proud tailor took the oath--
cranking back the clock.
Andrew Johnson, who was Abraham Lincoln’s Vice President, would lead the reconstruction, or rebuilding of the South. He was a tailor. Unfortunately, he was Lincoln’s opposite. As if looking backward from the man he followed, Johnson called slaves “savages” and believed they should not be citizens. The House drafted eleven articles of impeachment against him, based on differences he had with the Congress, but he was acquitted by the Senate.
I loved this project. I read about each president, watched videos about them, found a focus and wrote a haiku. Degregorio’s The Complete Book of the U.S. Presidents informed me. The presidents from the distant past were much easier to write haikus about than the ones I knew in real time.
I might as well finish this post with two others :
Richard Nixon
He strove to befriend
Mao Tse Tung--but his real foes
dwelled inside his head.
William Clinton
An embarrassing
public debate--we explored
our lesser angels.
Both men were better known to us than Andrew Johnson. Here’s to the holidays and our all too human presidents.
