Kokuu
08-09-2021, 10:32 AM
Dear all
Yesterday I attended a one day Zen haiku workshop (https://www.upaya.org/program/summer-a-haiku-refuge/?id=2413) with Upaya Zen Center. The teachers were Roshi Joan Halifax, Natalie Goldberg (the author of Writing Down the Bones and recent haiku pilgrimage Three Simple Lines), Clark Strand (a haiku poet and former monk at New York Zen Center) and Kaz Tanahashi.
Upaya hosts annual haiku retreats and I have listened to them for some time so it was wonderful to be able to attend online this time around.
Clark and Natalie have different approaches to haiku, with Clark having a strict adherence to the 5-7-5 form, which is rarely used in English Language Haiku now, and Natalie being more free form. Kaz, as you would imagine, knows a lot about traditional Japanese haiku.
Anyway, I can recommend listening to the podcasts of this when they come out, and you might get to hear me ask a question and have one of my haiku read.
These were a number of works I submitted for the workshop and wrote during in response to some season word (kigo) prompts and suggested forms. It is amazing what being in the company of 400 (!) other writers can do!
Toro Nagashi (floating lanterns)
the souls of our ancestors
return to the lake
running the cross breeze
between clumps of old hawthorn
iron age hill fort
crayfish linguine
a shade tree spreads her branches
into the river
thorn bramble woodland
my daughter sings a fairy
out of moss and sticks
Tuscan hills
I gently grill
half a zucchini
the back then front
of a bee
zucchini flower
falling in love
with the evening light
sweet chestnut flowers
my hands
just strong enough for a cup
chamomile tea
my eyelids
lose their battle with sleep
morning zazen
Gassho
Kokuu
-sattoday/lah-
Yesterday I attended a one day Zen haiku workshop (https://www.upaya.org/program/summer-a-haiku-refuge/?id=2413) with Upaya Zen Center. The teachers were Roshi Joan Halifax, Natalie Goldberg (the author of Writing Down the Bones and recent haiku pilgrimage Three Simple Lines), Clark Strand (a haiku poet and former monk at New York Zen Center) and Kaz Tanahashi.
Upaya hosts annual haiku retreats and I have listened to them for some time so it was wonderful to be able to attend online this time around.
Clark and Natalie have different approaches to haiku, with Clark having a strict adherence to the 5-7-5 form, which is rarely used in English Language Haiku now, and Natalie being more free form. Kaz, as you would imagine, knows a lot about traditional Japanese haiku.
Anyway, I can recommend listening to the podcasts of this when they come out, and you might get to hear me ask a question and have one of my haiku read.
These were a number of works I submitted for the workshop and wrote during in response to some season word (kigo) prompts and suggested forms. It is amazing what being in the company of 400 (!) other writers can do!
Toro Nagashi (floating lanterns)
the souls of our ancestors
return to the lake
running the cross breeze
between clumps of old hawthorn
iron age hill fort
crayfish linguine
a shade tree spreads her branches
into the river
thorn bramble woodland
my daughter sings a fairy
out of moss and sticks
Tuscan hills
I gently grill
half a zucchini
the back then front
of a bee
zucchini flower
falling in love
with the evening light
sweet chestnut flowers
my hands
just strong enough for a cup
chamomile tea
my eyelids
lose their battle with sleep
morning zazen
Gassho
Kokuu
-sattoday/lah-