This wonderful project of audio haiku is now open in Ohio–http://www.holdenarb.org/seasons-of-haiku-interpretive-trail/
The brainchild of Julie Warther, it allows visitors to listen to contemporary haiku expressing the seasons. I’d love to see it!
My sister sent me the bulbs last winter.This is the slowest amaryllis to bloom ever!
It has actually left me kind of speechless.
Luckily, this haiku showed up from the talented Hannah Mahoney:
meant for each other this light and the daylily
-Hannah Mahoney http://tinywords.com/2018/04/13/27039/
the famous view
covered in fog–
still, selfie sticks
photographing
white winter grass, my own
hair in the wind…
Questions
1. What is your personal/aesthetic relationship to the poetic line? That is, how do you understand it, use it, etc.
As a poet with a broad range, at any given time I could be writing a haiku, a received form or a piece of flash fiction. This means that I could be focusing on a work anywhere between one line (a monostich) or a paragraph or more (flash). The important first step is to get my initial thoughts on screen, then I try to proceed at an unhurried pace, to find the line that is pleasing to my ear and eye, that fits the essence of the piece. In the draft stage I want to see what emerges – happily now and again the first try is pretty close to the finished product. If there isn’t a good definition then at some point I will start a revision, at which stage (for example) a sonnet may become a free verse poem, or vice versa. The process is organic, with the line taking its length and shape on the page in the most natural way possible, the line breaks setting the pace, working like gears to drive the reader along. The line needs to work with and not against the poem’s internal rhythm and cadences, to be in sympathy with its words and sounds, and the reaction the whole invokes.
2. Do you find a relationship between words and writing and the human body? Or between your writing and your body?
Yes, in the sense that we produce the fruit of who and what we are. I suspect that the traits expressed in our words are linked as much to our physiology and psychology as to our life experiences. When writing a specifically body-oriented poem (for instance, about a C-section, or a burn, or a colonoscopy), the sense of relationship between words and body is keener, simply by definition, but all poems seem visceral rather than intellectual at source. It’s a fascinating question and this body/writing correlation is something I would like to explore in more depth.
3. Is there anything you dislike about being a poet?
I often think that it increases my intensity when what I really need to do is lighten up! Saying that, I do enjoy writing light verse from time to time. To me writing is a work of faith, and this is exciting but also quite daunting. It’s not the same as having a skill; for instance, I play the flute and know I can pick up the instrument and play a piece as long as I have practiced enough. With poetry, even if you are honing your craft, understand the dynamics, and have publications to your name, you are creating something from nothing each time (as all artists are) and you cannot afford to lose your self-belief. This is not always easy. A poet must accept that the poetry business involves regular rejection and so develop a kind of impassivity to all that, yet still stay sensitive to inspiration and new ideas.
Haiku
guessing his name…
the scent of jasmine
on fine rain
Stardust, February 2018
premature birth
I choose the thinnest needles
and the softest wool
Pulse, 16 February 2018
sundog an unexpected windfall
The Asahi Shimbun, Asahi Haikuist Network, 16 February 2018
morning kiss
the warm sting
of his bristles
Chanokeburi, Love Videoanthology, 14 February 2018
Lee Nash lives in France and freelances as an editor and proofreader. Her poems have appeared in print and online journals including Acorn, Ambit, Angle, Magma, Mezzo Cammin, Orbis, Poetry Salzburg Review, Sentinel Literary Quarterly, The Heron’s Nest, and The Lake. Her first poetry chapbook, Ash Keys, is published by Flutter Press. You can find a selection of Lee’s poems on her website: leenashpoetry.com. http://flutterpress2009.blogspot.fr/2017/11/new-release-ash-keys-by-lee-nash.html
Today we’re excited to have our opening at Studio Kura. I expect to have photographs soon. But in the interim, I’m posting a renga written by me and Isabel Winson-Sagan.
We started in Santa Fe in late December and finished here a few days ago. I’ve left in our initials and numbering of links so you can see the process. The moon links aren’t in the traditional spots–it’s a pretty free approach. Might be some more revision yet. Enjoy!
1.These mountains
turn purple at dusk
then darker still
-MS
2.Hawk on a cactus
silent snow
-IWS
3.Winter triangle
brighter than other
constellations
-MS
4.New Year’s in Japan
the paper store is closed
-IWS
5.Waning moon
an old woman
sets out lettuce beds
-MS
6.My mother sings
at the Ikisan station
-IWS
7.New house slippers
purple with polka dots,
Coming of Age Day
-MS
8.Cranes out on the river bed
no- boys in soccer shorts
-IWS
9. Dark, light, dark, light
from the train window–
I touch my own pulse
-MS
10. Thunder clap awakens me,
blissful stretch under quilt
-MS
11. A steamed pork bun
cold kitchen
bright red tea kettle
-IWS
12. If the weather clears
I’ll understand…everything
-MS
13. Wind that rattles
paper screens-
passing dragon?
-IWS
14. Your mouth on mine
knows no country
-MS
15. Words wrap around
my arms, they keep my spirit
from wandering.
-IWS
16. Our neighbor across the way
lives like a monk
-MS
17. A dog pants over
the water bowl, rabbit—
a flash, and gone.
-IWS
18. Hot asphalt, the whole city
strolls to a boom box beat.
-MS
19. At the window
naked woman, a breeze
moves the curtains
-IWS
20. He looks at her from the bed
still surprised at his luck.
-MS
21. Long hair down her back
wet from the bath, sticks to skin
footprints left behind
-IWS
22. Knit one, purl two, dropped stitch
just that kind of afternoon
-MS
23. Two rabbits
making mochi
in the moon.
-MS
24. The tomb on the street corner
at night, he goes walking.
-IWS
25. Day of the dead
a sugar skull
with my name.
-MS
26. A stiff neck from reading
years pass
-IWS
27. A fleeting dream
all that remains, faint taste
sweet tea and milk
-MS
28. A lonely child looks out,
his computer screen glows
-IWS
29. Fantastical
castle– is the hero
prince or demon?
-MS
30. Watching anime under
covers with my mom
-IWS
31. Leafless tress,
a pencil sketch
against the moon
-MS
32. The A-bomb dropped
here, as well
-IWS
33. Hiroshima, don’t
feed the pigeons or sleep
in the peace park
-MS
34. Bulbs finally come up
I see your hat
-IWS
35. Laundry blooms bright
beneath
falling blossoms
-MS
36. A patient reward
new green shoots of garlic.
-IWS
shadowed graveyard
stones of strangers
a foreign language
after the rain
old man on a bicycle
pedals by
I sit writing
by the shrine—perplex
the neighbors
I traveled
my whole life, just to enjoy
this
twisted leafless trees—
this slick moss
almost trips me up
politics blares
from the passing van,
clumps of narcissus
Photographs by Isabel Winson-Sagan
