REAlity Bytes: Haiku. Experimenting with Poetry

One of my interests is practising haiku and senryû, two types of Japanese short verse.

A classical shasei haiku consists of three unrhymed lines arranged in a syllable count of 5-7-5. A haiku reflects on some aspect of nature and expresses a single idea. It has two juxtaposed thematic units separated by the kireji, cutting word or pause at the end of either the first or the second line. An important element of a haiku is the kigo word, a seasonal anchor, representative of the season in which the poem is set.

I'm intrigued by the seemingly simplistic elements, expressly formulated and organized so as to be maximally suggestive. Shasei haiku does not attempt at beauty in expression but elegance in sudden, precise revelation. Haiku is said to be the most accessible and the most inaccessible form of poetry.

Senryû resembles haiku in form and length, but the two couldn't be further apart thematically. Senryû involves personal experience and often tends toward (black) humor, double entendres, and intense implication.

In the West, 20th-century haiku has been associated with the modernist movement and imagist poetry in particular. Haikus in the Western, Kerouacian sense are less restricted content-wise; the American free-form may be urban or resemble Zen koans. Master Kerouac called his lot 'pomes' and 'pops'.

Interested readers will appreciate the articles 'Essence of Haiku' by Bruce Ross (in Modern Haiku Vol 38.3, autumn 2007) and 'The Disjunctive Dragonfly: A Study of Disjunctive Method and Definitions in Contemporary English‑language Haiku' by R. Gilbert (in Blithe Spirit 18, December 2007).