Western haiku
Mar. 3rd, 2003 06:37 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cosmolinguistMy creative writing class took a "field trip" today, spending the last 15 or 20 minutes of class in the McGinnis Room, this cool little place in the basement of the library.
I found this tiny book by Jack Kerouac.
At the end of the book I found my favorite part, a page with SOME WESTERN HAIKUS written at the top. And then:
Explanatory Note by the Author: The "Haiku" was invented and developed over hundreds of years in Japan to be a complete poem in seventeen syllables and to pack a whole vision of life into three short lines. A "Western Haiku" need not concern itself with the seventeen syllables since Western languages cannot adapt themselves to the fluid syllabilic Japanese. I propose that the "Western Haiku" simply say a lot in three short lines in any Western language.
Above all, a haiku must be very simple and free of all poetic trickery and make a little picture and yet be as airy and graceful as a Vivaldi Pasorella. Here is a great Japanese Haiku that is simpler and prettier than any Haiku I could ever write in any language:A day of quiet gladness,--
Mount Fuji is veiled
In misty rain.
(Basho) (1644-1694)
He gives a few more examples and then a bunch of his own. I found one I absolutely love, for no good reason. I thought it might be lame to get such a little book when I was surrounded by so many impressive tomes, and lame to pick such a little poem in the little book, but I liked it too much not to.Missing a kick
at the icebox door
It closed anyway.
(Edit from the future: 2012 me is chagrined that I used "lame" hereo; this very day I am getting enmeshed in a conversation about ableism, "freedom of speech" and things, kicked off by the flippant use of that very same word.)
I found this tiny book by Jack Kerouac.
At the end of the book I found my favorite part, a page with SOME WESTERN HAIKUS written at the top. And then:
Explanatory Note by the Author: The "Haiku" was invented and developed over hundreds of years in Japan to be a complete poem in seventeen syllables and to pack a whole vision of life into three short lines. A "Western Haiku" need not concern itself with the seventeen syllables since Western languages cannot adapt themselves to the fluid syllabilic Japanese. I propose that the "Western Haiku" simply say a lot in three short lines in any Western language.
Above all, a haiku must be very simple and free of all poetic trickery and make a little picture and yet be as airy and graceful as a Vivaldi Pasorella. Here is a great Japanese Haiku that is simpler and prettier than any Haiku I could ever write in any language:
Mount Fuji is veiled
In misty rain.
(Basho) (1644-1694)
He gives a few more examples and then a bunch of his own. I found one I absolutely love, for no good reason. I thought it might be lame to get such a little book when I was surrounded by so many impressive tomes, and lame to pick such a little poem in the little book, but I liked it too much not to.
at the icebox door
It closed anyway.
(Edit from the future: 2012 me is chagrined that I used "lame" hereo; this very day I am getting enmeshed in a conversation about ableism, "freedom of speech" and things, kicked off by the flippant use of that very same word.)