writing the heart of something Archives

A WRITING BLOG About Playing Around with a Story Line in Different Literary Genres and Different Literary Categories

Writing Leap #29

Writing Haiku

Hi Writers,

Haiku is magic. An ancient form of Japanese poetry it lasers into the heart of an experience in seventeen syllables arranged in three lines in a 5-7-5 order. Some Haiku poets in English take liberties with this structure. Not Billy Collins, former U.S. Poet Laureate. “I want the indifference and the inflexibiliy of a seventeen-syllable limit to balance my self-expressive yearnings.” Here is Billy Collins.

The dog stops to sniff

the poems of others

before she recites her own

Dag Hammarskjold ignores tradition.

In the castle’s shadow

the flowers closed

long before evening

Either way writing the haiku is the ultimate practice in taking a huge, multilayered feeling or observation and finding the simple, deep heartbeat.

So go ahead writers! Poets, fiction writers, non-fiction writers. Practicing Haiku is a magic little secret to writing what you mean. It will spill over and clarify your writing voice in all genres. I promise. Try it over and over until your poem gives you the innermost seed that evokes so much more. The form itself edits the writing.

Haiku often has references to the natural world juxtaposed with other thoughts. The story line is: Observing Nature

Here is my attempt. Very non-traditional.

Rosy wedding sunset

illuminating the love in his song

for his son and new bride.

I heard the music of his soul.

(The additional fourth line may eliminate my poem as Haiku. Not sure.)

Happy Haiku everyone,