Hi everyone here,
I’m really impressed by traditional haikus—I mean the ones that include a seasonal word (kigo) and a cutting word (kireji).
I don’t know Japanese, and therefore I miss a lot—I miss everything that’s lost in translation. But somehow, I understand the spirit, and I truly appreciate it.
The idea of revealing a brief instant of sublime beauty—whether tragic or uplifting—through simple observation. Revealing a moment embedded in the eternally recurring cycle of life.
I love the way these short poems are created—not with verbal tricks, but through the power of vivid description. It’s not an intellectual exercise—it’s the opposite.
It is a meditation—not in the sense of a transcendent experience, but in the sense of passive, silent observation, until reaching the point of truly being able to see, hear, and feel.
To be fully present, entirely in the moment—so passive, and yet so active. Perhaps this is close to what the Chinese call Wu Wei.
It might seem strange to explain a Japanese art form using a Chinese philosophical term—but it’s really not. Japan drew much inspiration from China, so I’m simply continuing that tradition.
I admire what is done in haiku: the art of saying so much with so few words. It’s an art of people rooted in the land—I mean in the soil. Peasants used to be capable of that—before they were swept into the fast-paced world of international markets.
The cultural world seems to have followed this same acceleration—this intellectualisation of everything. The flow of words has overtaken expression. Artistic creation has moved further and further away from its natural models. Abstraction became concept, became idea.
Traditional haiku do the exact opposite: they try to represent. They try to concentrate as much being as possible into a few words.
After praising traditional haiku so much, I’d be mad to claim I can write one.
But I can try—to present it as a process, not a goal. I’m not pretending anything. I’m just sharing a moment from my learning journey…
Menacing over The massive black and blue cloud Only drizzle drops
