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Out on my bike ride this morning it occurred to me that poppies would make a great one word haiku.
Now before I get into the poppy issue let me introduce myself, I’m Patricia for those of you visiting for the first time, but to everyone listening, welcome and thank you very much for coming along.
I’ll get back to poppies in a minute but first let me tell you what I have for you today. Well, we’re definitely putting our thinking caps on because today Stanford M Forrester has very kindly joined me to try and get to grips with yūgen, more of that shortly. To end today a little snippet from Ben Gaa.
Don’t forget that we are writing haiku and senryu using selective realism this month, email them until the 20th of June 2021. This month’s editing team, Jim, Robert and Ron Craig are waiting with bated breath to read what you are sending us. I like to give them a few poems per day, so keep them coming. If you aren’t sure about our expectations, have a look at the show notes or the YouTube presentation for podcast S4 E9. It’s all there, I promise.
June’s video prompt is up on YouTube. Do please go along, have a look, put your haiku / senryu in the comments and comment on the work of others. Let’s encourage each other, like a big virtual hug.
A couple of thank yous, as always I’m grateful for the coffee you buy me and this month I almost had enough coffee money to pay for the podcast’s soundcloud subscription so that was really, really appreciated.
Also lots of thanks to everyone who replies to my mailing. It’s so nice to hear from you.
Anyway, to get back to poppies. You could write poppies in blood red on a white page, but I think that’s a tad hyperbolic. How about poppies centre page black on white?
Poppies are seasonal, so for me they evoke Spring. They have impact, such a beautiful vivid colour and they have a yūgen effect. The poppies of the fields of Flanders, or Picardy, the first world war and the souls who lost their lives during the war.
I’m pretty sure that if I’ve thought of it, someone else has written it, but I can’t find it on a cursory search. So, tell me what are your thoughts? Email me.
Now the main event. You may agree or disagree with what we discuss today, either way let me know, or if you would like to build on what we’ve done today, email me your thoughts.
Well you know me by now, I get over excited at the thought of talking to my haiku idols and here I am again, having a zoom chat with one of my haiku heros Stanford M Forrester, editor of bottle rockets.
For those of you who don’t know Stanford, here’s a little bit about him:
Stanford M. Forrester is a past president of the Haiku Society of America and founder and editor of “bottle rockets: a collection of short verse”. His poems have appeared in the anthology “Haiku”, published by Knopf in the Everyman’s Library Pocket Poets Series edited by Peter Washington and “American Zen: A Gathering of Poets”, published by Bottom Dog Press. In 2003, one of his haiku took first seat in the 57th Annual Basho Anthology Contest in Ueno, Japan, and another was a prizewinner in the Haiku International Association’s 6th Annual Haiku Contest in 2004. He has served as a judge for the Japan Society in New York City, the Haiku Society of America, and the Haiku Poets of Northern California. Sometimes he goes by his haigo, “Sekiro” which means “stone dew” or “dew on a stone”.
In a wee while we’re going to talk yūgen but as you know, when I have a guest I like to read you some of their work:
depression –
summer and unemployment
both running out
Stanford M Forrester, Staten Island
tea ceremony –
it begins and ends
with an empty cup
Stanford M Forrester, smiling anyway, selected haiku and senryu
Definitions of yūgen:
Yūgen is a compound word each part, yū and gen, meaning “cloudy impenetrability,” and the combination meaning “obscurity,” “unknowability,” “mystery,” “beyond intellectual calculability,” but not “utter darkness.” It is not at all presentable to our sense-intellect as this or that, but this does not mean that the object is altogether beyond the reach of human experience. It is experienced by us, and yet we cannot take it out into the broad daylight of objective publicity. It is something we feel within ourselves, and yet it is an object about which we can talk, it is an object of mutual communication only among those who have the feeling of it. It is hidden behind the clouds, but not entirely out of sight, for we feel its presence, its secret message being transmitted through the darkness however impenetrable to the intellect. The feeling is all in all. Cloudiness or obscurity or indefinability is indeed characteristic of the feeling. But it would be a great mistake if we took this cloudiness for something experientially valueless or devoid of significance to our daily life. We must remember that reality or the source of all things is to the human understanding an unknown quantity, but that we can feel it in a most concrete way.
defined by DT Suzuki, Zen and Japanese Culture
Yūgen does not, as has sometimes been supposed, have to do with some other world beyond this one, but rather with the depth of the world we live in, as experienced through cultivated imagination. Is an awareness of the universe that triggers emotional responses too deep and mysterious for words.
https://momentsofyugen.com/the-meaning-of-yugen/
“Like an echo after the clang of a brass bell”
Robert D. Wilson, A STUDY OF JAPANESE AESTHETICS SEVEN ESSAYS WITH A FOCUS ON THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN HOKKU AND HAIKU
forgotten temple —
a yellow flower
offers itself
temple ruins . . .
pieces of a buddha
still praying
from “Haiku” Published by Knopf/Everyman Pocket Poets Series 2003
hide and seek
I disappear into
the sound of rain
Jacquie Pearce,
3rd prize Martin Lucas Haiku Award 2020,
Presence#69
morning light –
all the stone buddhas
robed in gold
So, those are our examples of haiku using yūgen. If you are reading this and haven’t listened to the podcast, the Youtube offering or the workshop also on YouTube I recommend that you do.
It’s hard and we’ve only scratched the surface. So I thought I would give you my take aways from today, to give you an idea what the editing team will be looking for when it comes to writing for the topic:
- Write about what you know
- Write about something ordinary, but highlight the extraordinary
- Write about something that has moved you, because it will surely connect with your reader
- Show your reader, don’t tell them
- Aim for something deep and mysterious or something which expresses wonderment,
How can you elicit that feeling of yūgen? Here’s some ideas:
- Write about something of the past
- You can go way back in history or just to your childhood
- Write about a subtle interchanging of realms
- Chose words which elicit a sense of darkness, mystery, grace or beauty Stanford gave you some tips on that
- Express the beauty in the ordinary
- Remember our poems always take place in the present
So that’s almost it for today. A last reminder that the topic for this month of June 2021 is selective realism, any haiku or senryu you like just use that tool from your tool box. Emails only and I am strict on the deadline.
Next time on the podcast your beautiful poems written to include kigo. Do come along, I think you’ll enjoy it.
I’ll leave you will a little snippet from Ben Gaa, but until next time,keep writing….
Don’t forget to visit Stanford’s website, maybe even buy some of his books, read the submission guidelines for bottle rockets and submit.
If you think I’ve left anything out or need to amend anything in the show notes, just email me please… Ciao
