First up, I have three haiku for you that I wrote in my usual fashion: while puttering around the house and garden, hopeful that I would remember them when I found a pen and paper to record them with. I'm getting much better at this!
I took a poetry workshop a few days ago, but I was the only person in my hillbilly town to sign up. The program director decided to sit in on the class, so there were two of us writing poems. We were instructed to write haiku in the 5/7/5 form. I managed to toss a few off in the time we were allotted to write one (speed haiku), and they were pretty good!
an overcast morn
I sip a cup of coffee
while writing haiku
time passes slowly
in a small town arts center
as leaves flutter down
when will poppies come?
after frittilaria
but before lilies
There was some discussion as to whether the word "while" has one syllable or two, so we decided to pronounce it with an American southern accent, "wahl."
I don’t speak any Japanese, and am not sure why Japanese haiku require more syllables than those in English do, but I’m wondering if that has anything to do with pesky words such as articles, conjunctions and prepositions. So, I have rewritten those three haiku without as many pesky words, and tried to make decent haiku out of them. I like these much better; more is left to the reader's imagination. I have also been smitten with a desire to insert kigo into my tiny poems, without spelling out the season. How do you think I did here?:
overcast morn,
steaming coffee,
haiku appear
leaves flutter
time passes slowly
coffee shop
poppies -
first frittilaria
then lilies
I wrote a few other things in the workshop, but my favorite is this limerick:
Thank you so much for reading my tiny poems!
