senryu/haiku question

[WickedEve]

Should I be calling this Chatterbox Defense Senryu, instead of Chatterbox Defense Haiku?

Chatterbox Defense Haiku

Shotgun syllables
shoot you with rapid fire words.
Play dead as smoke clears.

 

[Rybka]

Senryu

Best I can tell, since it is about the human condition and not nature, it would fall into the senryu classification.

Regards, RYbka

 

[Senna Jawa]

Should I be calling this Chatterbox Defense Senryu, instead of Chatterbox Defense Haiku?

Chatterbox Defense Haiku

Shotgun syllables
shoot you with rapid fire words.
Play dead as smoke clears.

It's a nice poem. But it's neither haiku nor senryu. Of course U may call it any way U like.

 

[Senna Jawa]

Re: Senryu

Best I can tell, since it is about the human condition and not nature, it would fall into the senryu classification.

Regards, RYbka

There used to be long articles about the diff between haiku and senryu. Finally, some years ago, on rec.arts.poems I put finger on the distinction between the two. Haiku may or may not have humor in it. But if it does it is a goodnatured humor. Senryu is like haiku except that to be senryu it must have mean humor. That's all. (Later, A.Aleksiev, who was a participant of the same rec.arts.poems and other forums as me at the time, has adopted my definition of senryu on his haiku page and perhaps elsewhere but failed to give me credit; he did so only for a much less original comment on the nature of haiku itself).

As I said in the other post, WE's 3-liner is a nice poem but neither haiku nor senryu. There is a tendency today to call every short poem of 3 or less lines "haiku". This is unfortunate since it is a waste of a very crisp term, which should serve to educate poets and the public. When words r diluted the ability to communicate suffers.


Regards,

 

[WickedEve]

So for a poem to be either haiku and senryu it needs to meet other criteria other than 3 lines and 5-7-5? Haiku needs to have a nature theme, correct? And I read that senyru is about the human condition, but I didn't see anything about "mean humor."

 

[WickedEve]

I submitted one called bug light haiku. I don't call it haiku unless it's 5-7-5, but I know there's more to it.

Is this haiku:
My child in the dark
chases fireflies; asks me to
catch her a bug light.

 

[Senna Jawa]

Re: Re: Senryu

(Later, A.Aleksiev, [...]).

I am so sorry. His name is Alexey V. Andreyev. We were good Internet friends. I didn't mean to sound harsh on him. To make up for my horrible misspell let me make up to him by providing a bit of PR for Alexey:

                about Alexey

                Moyayama

The last title shows his sense of humor which Rybka might appreciate . I used to give Alezey a bit of hard time for not applying himself sufficiently but I always admired his native talent for haiku.

Elswhere I mentioned nice ASGP's chapbooks with their great poetry. It is hard to believe that they actually sell them for $2 a piece.

If U r interested in haiku (and every poet should), U may check haiku in its about best modern version in

                Tenement Landscapes
by
                Paul David Mena

who among modern haiku writers is not second to anybody with the only exception of the late Keiko Imaoka.

Regards,

 

[perks]

haiku, has like 40 different rules classically.


when I write it,

I try to stick to the

three lines
5-7-5 syllable count
mention of a Season
Zen observation
Humorous twist
and no punctuation

and of course I like to add sex, but that's not a poetic requirement, that's a perky requirement


She talks on the phone
Sexy summer whore for hire
laughing when she comes

 

[WickedEve]

haiku, has like 40 different rules classically.


when I write it,

I try to stick to the

three lines
5-7-5 syllable count
mention of a Season
Zen observation
Humorous twist
and no punctuation

and of course I like to add sex, but that's not a poetic requirement, that's a perky requirement


She talks on the phone
Sexy summer whore for hire
laughing when she comes

Yes, I saw all the rules! I like your haiku or whatever it is. At this point, I'm just not sure.

 

[perks]

Yes, I saw all the rules! I like your haiku or whatever it is. As this point, I'm just not sure.

I say pick what you want. I'll let you<grin>

and by the way


Ninety-nine bottles
of beer on the wall ninety
nine bottles of beer

 

[WickedEve]

I think I'll just write 3 line stuff, with 5-7-5 syllable things, and call it "maybeku."

 

[perks]

I think I'll just write 3 line stuff, with 5-7-5 syllable things, and call it "maybeku."

hehehehe

or fuckuuuu

 

[WickedEve]

I could call it pooku, because it's a shitty example of haiku.

I guess I better read more about haiku...

 

[perks]

I could call it pooku, because it's a shitty example of haiku.

I guess I better read more about haiku...

beauku

lol, that's a LOT of french haiku

 

[Senna Jawa]

I submitted one called bug light haiku. I don't call it haiku unless it's 5-7-5, but I know there's more to it.

Naive people always see 5-7-5, which is the least important haiku feature. In English true haiku should have fewer syllables. Length wise I decided that there is nothing to the automatic line lengths of modern haiku. Haiku simply should be minimal (one should not be able to carve a meaningful subpoem out of haiku).

Keiko Imaoka addressed the issue of the length of haiku in English. While she allowed for 5-7-5 version she stressed the fact that such 5-7-5 English texts do not correspond, information wise, to japanese haiku, that they r already close (information wise) to japanese tanka. How true! Several of my tanka indeed are about 17 syllables and not much more (on the other hand I also used to write "fat tanka"). Keiko pointed out that the length of haiku in English should be about 3-5-3 (eleven syllables). She was convincingly against a rigid line length structure--hence she said "about" and not "exactly".

Is this haiku:

  My child in the dark
  chases fireflies; asks me to
  catch her a bug light.

I am glad to say (it doesn't happen too often) that yes, it is a haiku. It is a poor one though, too wordy. The virtual repetition (avoided on the literal level only superficially) indicates the source of its weakness: fireflies versus a bug light and chases versus catch show that U r going in circles, which has a tiresome effect on a (poetry trained) reader. In a short form when it is too wordy then it is no wonder that there is not much to the text. There is something to it but not enough.

Regards,

 

[Rybka]

Google Search

A Google search shows that most "experts" agree with S.J. about 17 syllables in Japanese not being the same in English. They seem to recommend 11 to 15 syllables in English. However most of them disagree with his assertion that haiku does not allow humor.

Regards, Rybka

 

[Senna Jawa]

So for a poem to be either haiku and senryu it needs to meet other criteria other than 3 lines and 5-7-5?

Forget 5-7-5. Make it real short. And have no more than 4 lines, perhaps 3 or 2. One excellent haiku writer switched to 1 line.

Haiku needs to have a nature theme, correct?

There is MUCH more to it.

And I read that senyru is about the human condition,

That's a meaningless statement because directly or indirectly haiku and poetry in general are also about the "human condition".

but I didn't see anything about "mean humor."

Now U did. Before me people never said crisply what the difference between the two is. They only mentioned humor and had a vague intuition; the attempts at defining the difference were clumsy, unclear, void of much sense.

Regards,

 

[Senna Jawa]

Re: Google Search

A Google search shows that most "experts" agree with S.J. about 17 syllables in Japanese not being the same in English. They seem to recommend 11 to 15 syllables in English. However most of them disagree with his assertion that haiku does not allow humor.

Regards, Rybka

Rybka, don't misquote me, this is ridiculous. I said that humor in haiku, when present, is goodnatured. There is a lot of warm humor and good auto-irony (self-irony, directed at himself) in Issa haiku-- the third classic Master, after Busho and Buson.

Regards,

 

[Rybka]

Moyayama

The last title shows his sense of humor which Rybka might appreciate .

Thank you S.J. I did appreciate it. - How is your math research and your chess going? I haven't read anything new recently.

High regards, Rybka

 

[WickedEve]

I've read so much about haiku (some of it agrees, some doesn't) that I think I'll simply go read SJ's haiku and see if I understand what makes his haiku.

 

[WickedEve]

haiku?

across fresh paint
up the hill
sticky ant marches

 

[WickedEve]

Would this make it senryu?

across fresh paint
up the hill
sticky ant marches
till it meets foot

 

[WickedEve]

Haikuing yet?

monitor glows
moth on screen
surfs the web

 

[Rybka]

OR. . .

screen glows
monitor moth
web surfs

Regards, Rybka

 

[WickedEve]

I'm confused now!

On another site I saw 3 haikus about dating. The erotic group was awarded an editor's choice icon. The dating haikus were 5-7-5 and had no mention of nature.