the oak tree
pays no attention to flowers
a pose
– Matsuo Bashō
Translation by Jane Reichhold
🍃
-
-
spring breeze–
three ride the same horse
home– Kobayashi Issa
Translation by David G. Lanoue
🍃
-
winter confinement
again i’ll lean on
this post– Matsuo Bashō
Translation by Jane Reichhold
🍃
-
the ants’ road
from peaks of clouds
to here– Kobayashi Issa
Translation by David G. Lanoue
🍃
-
a Fuji wind
placed here on a fan
a souvenir of Tokyo– Matsuo Bashō
Translation by Jane Reichhold
🍃
-
The #HaikuSeed prompt last week was ivy with an additional photo prompt
There are a lot of great haiku and senryu submitted this week and it was difficult choosing which to comment on. I’m also preoccupied with other stuff related to designing the website and magazine, so this week’s commentary might not go too deep. But I hope you enjoy these brilliant haiku that beg your mind to imagine and think.
🍃
lake wind–
a wall ripples
in Chicago
Pippa PhillipsThe idea of a wall rippling is too interesting to not stop and picture it. If the fragment in L1 (line 1) is not about wind in one form or another, do you see how the brilliantly written L2 might not work the same way. The idea of a wall covered in ivy or creepers rippling would be a stretch but Pippa quite cleverly and tenderly directs the reader
towards the desired interpretation of a wall rippling. From there on, it is up to the reader to interpret the phrase a wall ripples anyway they could.
(more…)Great haiku make you want to read them over and over again. Why? There is no single reason. Sometimes you do not understand what you read completely but the verse has your attention anyway. Sometimes you love the imagery and your mind can’t help but go back to the first line to relive it. And so on. But the result is that with every re-read the scene and moment the haiku captures becomes increasingly vivid and sensory. This haiku is doing that to me.
-
they cry to each other
across a river
deer in love– Kobayashi Issa
Translation by David G. Lanoue
🍃
-
July
ordinarily the sixth night
is not like this– Matsuo Bashō
Translation by Jane Reichhold
🍃
-
the weak mosquito
whines to amuse…
a cold night– Kobayashi Issa
Translation by David G. Lanoue
🍃
