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I am über excited, well I was always going to be über excited about this episode but I am positively jumping for joy…
I’m Patricia and I’d like to welcome you to the Haiku Pea Podcast, episode 7 of the 4th series.
So why am I so enthusiastic about today’s episode? Well it’s because I’m chatting with Randy Brooks, all about the seasonal element of haiku, you can see the full chat on the poetry pea youtube channel, this is an edited version, and then Ted Sherman, one of the editing team for Poetry Pea this month is with us to tell us about a terrific project he is involved with, bringing haiku to prisons in the UK, and then as I was putting the finishing touches to the podcast, I got some terrific news.
You know last year I was invited to nominate some of our work for the Haiku Foundation’s Touchstone awards? Well, a piece of our work is on the long list…. I’m so happy, Congratulations Richard Tice, he’s on the long list with this monoku:
Breaking News: Richard’s monoku is on the shortlist: Congratulations Richard
our car never nearer the shimmer of black water on the desert road
Richard Tice, The haiku pea podcast Series 3, Episode 24, 2020
I’m delighted for Richard but so proud of us because the work we’ve been doing to contribute to the pantheon of excellent haiku and senryu has been recognised.
There are of course, many of the community who have been longlisted too. Congratulations to all of them.
Now before I introduce Randy to you, let me do a bit of housekeeping.
Thank you to James Young and Robert Horrobin for all their work last month as editors of the submissions to the No Ego podcast. You’ll be able to hear the poems they’ve chosen in the next episode. Now you need to keep this month’s editing team busy with your Euphony submissions. Haiku and senryu really utilising sound, deadline 20th April.
In a recent mailing I asked you to send me your 5 favourite haiku. Thanks to all of you who’ve done that already, but keep them coming…I’m creating a new project which I’ll tell you more about later in the year. You can send me haiku from any era, but please have one contemporary one and if you are thinking of your own, please only one.
And speaking about new projects, I’d like to try something new to keep us writing haiku. A monthly video to inspire you to write. You will find a video on our YouTube channel, Pea TV Prompts. Please go and have a look and write your haiku in the comments section. Comment on the other haiku. I’d really like our YouTube channel to be a way for the community to connect.
Now, let’s have a listen to the chat I had with Randy.
Bio:
Dr. Randy Brooks is the Dean of Arts & Sciences at Millikin University. He teaches courses on book publishing and various haikai poetry traditions. He and his wife, Shirley Brooks, are publishers of Brooks Books and co-editors of Mayfly haiku magazine. Randy is on the Executive Committee of the Haiku Society of America as the Electronic Media Officer. He maintains the HSA web site and edits the web sampler issues of Frogpond. He also serves as the webmaster for Modern Haiku Press and as web editor of Modern Haiku magazine. He is on the board for the American Haiku Archives. He also serves on the editorial board for the Red Moon Press Haiku Anthologies and Juxtaposition journal of scholarship on haiku. His most recent books include Walking the Fence: Selected Tanka and The Art of Reading and Writing Haiku: A Reader Response Approach, both published in 2019.
You can read the poems he used, plus bonus ones on the YourTube uncut version, but here are some extra links:
Books Randy read from:
Cox, Aubrie. Tea’s Aftertaste. (a former student)
Lyles, Peggy. To Hear the Rain: Selected Haiku of Peggy Lyles.
Swist, Wally. The Silence Between Us: Selected Haiku of Wally Swist.
Swede, George. Almost Unseen: Selected Haiku of George Swede.
Suzuki, Masajo. Love Haiku: Masajo Suzuki’s Lifetime of Love. Translated by Emiko Miyashita & Lee Gurga.
Available on Randy’s website
Matsuo Basho
Recommended by eddy lee:
Randy Brooks, School’s Out : Selected Haiku of Randy Brooks
This is what I took away with me from the chat, let me know what you thought.
• We can use the seasonal reference to express our inner emotion when writing the poem
• You don’t need to be literal with your season. That is just because you observed something in a particular season you don’t have to use that season when writing. You should be careful to be authentic though.
• Integrate the season into the poem, don’t use it as a full stop
The poem I used in the podcast
dirt farmer’s wife
at the screen door –
no tractor sound
Randy Brooks, Modern Haiku 8:1, 1977
I found it this in an essay in Frogpond 34.1 in 2011,
Now, you know I like a project that spreads the joy of writing and reading haiku. Well, here is the latest project that I have heard about. If you know of more, please email me to tell me about them, we’ll spread the word.
Ted Sherman who I know from the London Haiku group that I attend has been working on a haiku project with prisoners.
Ted Sherman Bio:
Ted Sherman grew up in London but has spent the last 11 years living in Bristol with his 3 kids. Alongside poetry he has a life long passion for music. He studied at the London College of Music and spend many years playing in bands. Ted has had his poetry published in Modern Haiku, Bloo Outlier, Seashores, Blithe Spirit, Frogpond, Prune Juice, Presence, and the Wales Haiku Journal. He has appeared on the People’s Poetry Podcast. Ted created and delivers, with a David Breakspear, the Pen and Corrections project, which works with serving prisoners in the UK to produce haiku.
“The prison project called Pen and Corrections is something I dreamt up a few months ago; I wanted to try a haiku writing project with people in recovery from drug and alcohol problems but I then heard David Breakspear talking on a podcast and I reached out to him with a request for his support in delivering my idea but with prisoners instead of people in recovery. David is a poet who has spent about 15 years in prison.
The project is essentially a short, written lesson/guide about writing haiku which given to prisoners. This guide provides space for prisoners to write their own haiku. These initial drafts are then sent back to me and David, we provide feedback to each prisoner and they submit final versions, which I will then collate into a booklet.
Please go to the website Ted has set up to learn more about and support his project. All profits from the project will go to charities which support the children of prisoners.
Ted’s appearance on the People’s Poetry PodcastTheir crowdfunding project is now up and running.
Well my thanks to Randy and Ted for talking to us today. I learnt a lot and enjoyed listening to all the different haiku we’ve heard today. I really hope you enjoyed the podcast, let me know…
Don’t forget both of these chats will be uncut and on our YouTube Channel.
Please support our writing project on YouTube. Watch the video and write your haiku in the comments and watch our Pea TV Haiku moments.
And very important, send me your haiku and senryu for our Euphony topic deadline 20th April. Your editors are waiting with bated breath to read them.
That’s it for today… I’ll see you in a couple of weeks with our No Ego podcast, til then, keep writing….
If there’s something missing from the podcast, or I’ve messed something up, just email me and I’ll put it right… Ciao
