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This week on the Haiku Pea Podcast part one of a workshop by Richard Tice on place names and a wonderful reading from Maeve O’Sullivan from her latest book Wasp of the Prayer Flag.
I’d like to welcome Richard Tice to the podcast not for the first time, if you remember, he was a wonderful community judge for us in episode 6 of the 4th series, for the topic of exaggerated perspective.
Richard wrote the very first essay for the Poetry Pea Journal this year, for the Spring 2021 edition. An essay about place names which, I have to say went down very well. Place names was a topic I had not considered before and it intrigued me. How can we incorporate place names meaningfully into our haiku and senryu? So I asked him to come along and talk to us about it. He’s not going to work through his essay but give us something a little new, a development of his theme.
Before we get going with Richard’s workshop let me tell you a little bit about him: He was born and still lives on the west coast of the USA, albeit in different States. But he has not always lived in there, he has lived in Japan and Korea.
Now I think Richard is or at least was something of a cyclist, as I am. I love being out and about on my bike and I found this poem which I love:
moving together—
noise of the bike, silence
of the dragonfly
Cicada 4:3 (1980)
rising toward
the slow turn of maple seeds
the child’s laughter
Modern Haiku 14:2 (1983)
Examples of Haiku Using Place Names
By Richard Tice beginning at 3 minutes 34
All translations of the Japanese haiku are by Richard Tice. I include the Japanese script when it is available in my source; otherwise, I give only the romanization.
araumi ya Sado ni yokotau Amanogawa
Matsuo Bashō
Makoto Ueda, Matsuo Bashō (1982)
the stormy sea!
stretching to Sado Island
the Milky Way
You can see Sado Island off the west coast of Honshu a little to the north near Niigata City. The island was a place of exile, including the Emperor Juntoku and the Buddhist prophet Nichiren. In Bashō’s time, it also contained the largest gold mine in Japan.
koe sumite hokuto ni hibiku kinuta kana
Matsuo Bashō
Ueda, Matsuo Bashō
the sound clearly
resonates as far as the Big Dipper—
fulling block
I’m not sure if heavenly bodies are considered utamakura in Japan, but Japanese poetry abounds with the names of constellations and stars and the favorite, the Milky Way. Fulling blocks are mallets used in washing to pound clothes soft and dry.
松島の黒海にうく夜光浮
Matsushima no kuroumi ni uku yakōuki
Richard Tice
Yomiuri Shimbun [Newspaper], 15 April 1980
In Matsushima’s black sea float luminescent floats
黄昏や萩にいたちの高台寺
tasogare ya hagi ni itachi no Kōdaiji
Yosa Buson
World Kigo Database
twilight—
in the bush clover a weasel
at Kōdai Temple
Kōdaiji (Lofty Tower Temple) is a Zen temple in the Higashiyama (East Mountain) district of Kyoto, established in 1606 by Nene, the widow of Hideyoshi Tokutomi, in honor of that great warlord and unifier of Japan. Buson moved to Kyoto in 1757 at the age of 42 and took the name Yosa. So the temple had been in existence for about 150 years and had been expanded significantly by then, though the area around the temple was still wooded. Bush clover blooms in late summer, so by the Japanese calendar at Buson’s time, this hokku is placed in autumn.
菜の花も一つ夜明やよしの山
na no hana mo hitotsu yoake ya Yoshino yama
Kobayashi Issa
Haiku of Kobayashi Issa, haikuguy.com/issa/
rape blossoms too
have one more daybreak—
Mt. Yoshino
Mt. Yoshino is legendary for its cherry blossoms, but Issa is there long after those blossoms have dropped. Instead, he sees fields of yellow rape blossoms, still flowering when he awakes. He may be playing with the brevity of cherry blossoms compared to the relatively longer life of other flowers. This also recalls Buson’s hokku “na no hana ya tsuki wa higashi ni hi wa nishi ni”: rape blossoms! moon in the east, sun in the west.
tsuki wo omoi hito wo omoite Suma ni aru
Takahama Kyoshi
Susumu Takiguchi, Kyoshi—A Haiku Master (1997)
thinking of the moon
thinking of people
here at Suma
Today Suma is a ward in Kobe with a white sandy beach, popular for swimming and sunbathing. It’s a meishō (famous place) in Japan: most notably the Taira clan—the Heikei—met its downfall and final defeat here by the Minamoto clan, recounted in the Heikei Monogatari (Tale of the Heikei).
Iyo ni umare Sagami ni oite koromogae
Takahama Kyoshi
Kyoshi—A Haiku Master
born in Iyo,
aging in Sagami—
the seasonal change of clothes
Iyo is a small city in Ehime Prefecture on the island of Shikoku, the smallest of the four main islands comprising Japan. Sagami was an important, heavily populated province south of Yokohama, incorporated into modern-day Kanagawa Prefecture. Each season is marked by the type of clothes we wear. As the poet changes his clothes for the new season, most likely winter (because of “aging”), he remarks that human life has its seasons too.
海へなだれアマヅンも銀漢も
umi e nadarete amazon mo ginkan mo
Takaha Shugyo
Selected Haiku (2003)
descending to the sea
both the Amazon
and the Milky Way
Ginkan is another word for the Milky Way. Gin here is silver—the metal and the color. Ama no Gawa also refers to the Milky Way and literally means Heavenly River. Perhaps Shugyo wanted to avoid the play on ama (heaven) and Ama in Amazon, as well as avoid writing river (gawa/kawa) for one but not the other. Instead, the word emphasizes the color silver (gin). Shugyo uses ginkan in some poems and ama no gawa in others. Both silver rivers seem to flow down into the sea.
道端に売る白桃も百済かな
michibata ni uru hakutō mo Kudara kana
Arima Akito
A Hidden Pond: Anthology of Modern Haiku, 2nd ed.
(2003)
by the wayside
selling white peaches
might also be Baekje
Kudara is the Japanese name for the ancient Korean kingdom of Baekje (approximately 18-660 BC), also romanized as Paekche. Located in southwest Korea, Baekje was one of the three ancient Korean kingdoms, along with Gokuryō and Shilla. Buddhism and Confucianism prospered there, and many temples and Buddha statues were built. It was also advanced in arts and culture. Baekje established close ties with the ancient Japanese kingdom of Yamato and brought Buddhism to that country. Like Professor Arima, my wife and I visited that area, but at different times, looking for evidence of the past kingdom. We found ancient sites and a museum, but Professor Arima also noticed the vendors. Kana is a traditional cutting word to end haiku, though in its modern usage it also has the feeling of “I wonder.” What remains of Baekje? Ruins, artifacts, some temples, statues, and maybe ordinary livelihoods and fruits that have existed for one and a half millennia.
Don’t forget this is part one of the workshop on place names. There will be a part 2 coming soon. If you are on the mailing list you will get a notification, if you’re not, sign up here on the website…
Place names is one of our topics for this year August 1-20th to be exact. Don’t forget to check the website for the second part of Richard’s workshop on place names when we look at English Language Haiku.
Maeve O’sullivan – Wasp on the Prayer Flag
Many of you will know Maeve because she has contributed to the podcast with her verse but for those of you who don’t let me tell you a little bit about her before I invite her to read from her book, the 5th book to be published by Alba publishing.
Maeve has been writing poetry for many years, and her long- and short-form poetry has been published and anthologised widely over the last twenty-five years. She participates in many poetry activities and organisations such as the British Haiku Society and the Hibernian Poetry Workshop.
You can find her on Twitter @writefromwithin and Facebook and brand new off the press, her website!
If you would like a copy of Maeve’s book so you can read all her wonderful poems please contact Alba Publishing.
That’s all folks!
I hope you enjoyed the podcast as much as I did putting it together. Thank you for coming along and keeping myself, Richard and Maeve company today.
Please check the show notes for all the details from today. You’ll have to buy Maeve’s book to read her poems again, but you can listen to Maeve anytime you want, reading her work with that lovely lilting accent, can’t you?
Don’t forget to get your yūgen poems submitted before the 20th July.
Join me next time when I’ll be joined by three more lovely judges to read your haiku and senryu composed using selective realism.
Until then, keep writing…
If there’s anything I’ve left out, please just email me and I’ll get back to you.
