The poetry way

[Senna Jawa]

Forget what you read, don't try to be eloquent, let go. And let's go.

Let's go back to Basho. I will present the most talked about 2 Basho haiku, but first I am quickly running over several with wonderful juxtapositions or poetic vision (poetic world). Look at this one, how delicate... no, I lost the page. Let's have those two classics first:

on a withered branch

a crow has settled--

autumn nightfall
​

​

Basho
(Eng.tr.--H.G.Henderson)
​

We look at the tree from a distance, it's quite dark, we see the crow (or crows), our eyes get tired or we think about something, and in the darkness we see just dark pools and rivers of blackness, which include branches, leaves and what used to be crows. Thus we get alert again, we squint our eyes, and with a difficulty we see crows again. For a moment, before they fade away again.

During the day we feel safe--the road, the meadow, the trees and the forest, they all have sharp contours, everything is finite and defined. Now it's dark, nothing is certain, and we are uncomfortably close to infinity.

That's the author's 50%. That's what Basho gave us directly. The black crows are there and they are not quite there. That's the image.

Now let's do our part. Do those crows exist? Will they be there when the complete darkness falls? Will the crows tomorrow morning be really the same as those which are slowly but surely vanishing in front of us?

What is that crow? Just an immobile, black silhouette in the darkness. Or is there warmness in that darkness? But even if there is warmth and life hidden in the black silhouette -- does it matter? To whom? It's an alien world.

Am I a crow? -- sometimes seen sometimes not? Are we all crows, vanishing in the darkness? irrelevant to the world, hardly existing at all? Is the significance of our loud daily activity just an illusion, while it is meaningless compared to the encroaching dark infinity, which will soon swallow us entirely? The world is the darkness. We are temporary, colorful flukes, but the universal darkness takes over, in silence. There is peace and beauty in the darkness.

===

I'll present the other haiku in the next post.

 

[Senna Jawa]

I have found that lost )) haiku:

orchid -- breathing
incense into
butterfly's wings
​

Basho
(Eng. tr. Lucien Stryk)
​

 

[Senna Jawa]

Now the other classic. I will give you what G.W.Henderson says is the literal translation--in my opinion it is the best:

old pond
frog jump-in
water sound
​

Basho
​

The image, the scene, the moment is so vivid that I will say no more. That's the author's 50%.

Now let's do the reader's part. Once again we face the most fundamental, existential questions. Is it all there is to the frog? Just the "ploosk" sound? We wink and the frog is gone?

There is (or is there?) another world under the surface of the water. Does it matter? There is no connection between our world and the frog's world under the water. we were together and we are not, not any more. Is it how we, humans, exist for each other? Just a ploosk? That's what we are to the world. The world will exist forever but we will vanish under the water (is there another world? do we come back on another shore? will it be us, who show up on that other shore?).

The frog has an entire underworld but we know nothing about it, there is no communication, there is only the death surface of the pond. And there is life all the same, with or without our recognition. We know so little!

 

[Senna Jawa]

I hope that now you see one of the powerful dimensions of poetry. The two presented, classical poems by Basho are perfectly modest and concrete: branch, crow, darkness, pond, frog, jump, sound. There are no words which would stand for general concepts, which would name emotions or ideas. But they give the reader the potential of creating the other 50% of the poem. In the given case we may invoke the basic questions of communication, knowledge, existence; we may even ask: does life make any sense? Is "ploosk" all there is to it? And then darkness and vanishing under the surface, without a trace? Perhaps small waves will last but a few more moments, and die. The old pond will remain unaffected by us.

 

[Angeline]

I hope that now you see one of the powerful dimensions of poetry. The two presented, classical poems by Basho are perfectly modest and concrete: branch, crow, darkness, pond, frog, jump, sound. There are no words which would stand for general concepts, which would name emotions or ideas. But they give the reader the potential of creating the other 50% of the poem. In the given case we may invoke the basic questions of communication, knowledge, existence; we may even ask: does life make any sense? Is "ploosk" all there is to it? And then darkness and vanishing under the surface, without a trace? Perhaps small waves will last but a few more moments, and die. The old pond will remain unaffected by us.

This is very interesting, Senna, and very helpful. I'm glad you are doing it again (maybe not the exact poems, but the explanations).

Here is a question (because your explanations always lead me to more questions).

Is it possible to write longer poems than haiku (or haiku-length) that use no words that describe emotions or ideas? I assume memories would be fine, as long as they're not identified as such.

Can you give a few examples of longer poems, non haiku poems, that achieve this or at least come close?

Thank you.

 

[Senna Jawa]

Now let's have an equally poetic, while a somewhat lighter haiku--there is room in poetry for so many different things. (But not for junk!)

dozing on horseback,
smoke from tea-fires
drifts to the moon.
​

Basho,
(Eng. tr. Lucien Stryk)
​

This one is wonderfully sensual. You're on the horse, half asleep, so that you smell as much or even more strongly than you see. Once again, pure, 100% concrete image, and no nonsense, no abstraction, no generality. Basho did his 50%. Part of his half is juxtaposition: the rider and the smoke. The rest is up to the reader.

Now the reader's part. We have more or less the vertical figure of the rider on the horse, and more or less the vertical smoke -- neither one of them perfectly vertical. Anyway, that's your juxtaposition. One part of it tells us more about the other. Thus this is a true juxtaposition (semantical, as opposed to a syntactical only, which is in fact a semantical simile).

Thus we may think about the soul of the rider rising to the moon. That smoke is our essence. We are more than just a figure on a horse.

 

[Senna Jawa]

Juxtaposition versus simile; semantics versus syntax

It's very-very important to see the difference. It's important to understand the syntactical and the semantical dimensions of these notions. The last haiku above is instructive in this respect. Its juxtaposition has obviously the syntax of a juxtaposition but it is also a true semantical juxtaposition.

For instance, the text like:

A small girl played with her big dolls on the dirty floor. Each night her mother was throwing the daughter's and the dolls' clothes to the washer.​

Syntax here is that of a juxtaposition. But semantically this text is a simile, which stresses certain similarity of the dolls and the girl, while from a semantic juxtaposition you would learn something new, something different about the girl (or about the dolls ).

 

[Senna Jawa]

This is very interesting, Senna, and very helpful. I'm glad you are doing it again (maybe not the exact poems, but the explanations).

Thank you, Angeline, for your kind reaction. I wanted to write these things a longer time ago but hostile atmosphere had stopped me. I had a personal (egoistic) reason too--it would be so nice to have also my own poems understood (it's possible to understand them ). The past days I kept thinking about our "fish", and I was sorry that we had so few exchanges, that I cannot hear his ideas or share my thoughts with him anymore. I think that he would be glad to see this thread, but I will never know.

Here is a question (because your explanations always lead me to more questions).

Is it possible to write longer poems than haiku (or haiku-length) that use no words that describe emotions or ideas? I assume memories would be fine, as long as they're not identified as such.

Can you give a few examples of longer poems, non haiku poems, that achieve this or at least come close?

Thank you.

I'll respond now with a few [not so few after all] words only, and will try more later (it's already almost 8am, and I should get a bit of sleep, I guess).

First of all, I don't want to leave an impression that I restrict poems to 100% concreteness. The second Basho haiku in this thread is not 100% pure. It has the orchard breathing (one could superficially claim, that possibly it is the lyrical subject breathing -- that would make the poem "pure" but it would be a non-convincing and poetically much weaker interpretation, less delicate).

One may write even about the emotions of the lyrical subject. There is just one law here. It has to be done in the same way one would write about a table or about a mountain, it has to be detached. Let the reader be emotional about it, but don't spill author's emotions on the reader just induce them (or not, depending on the reader--take this risk, there is no way around it). I'll try to provide illustrations (I am not a pro, hence it's not something I can do instantly). You may already check, without waiting for me, Du Fu's poems.

Now back to your actual question. Certainly it is possible to write arbitrarily long poems in a completely concrete way. I imagine that such a poem, to be good, would have to be naturally divided into relatively small segments; it should even have a hierarchical structure if it is truly long. The reason is simple: a long sequence of concrete items cannot make those items sufficiently important, i.e. poetic. Poetry requires a high ratio of artistic weight per word or per item, which is not possible if a longer text forms just one unit; then it is prosy, loess symbolic, it tends to be boring. BTW, adding non-concrete extras makes the situation in general worse. I guess, if it is poetry, and not prose, then the units of the text have to be relatively short. A long poem must be a tightly connected collection of short poems, perhaps it must be a hierarchical collection, when the poem is long-long (e.g. it may have stanzas and parts, consisting of stanzas).

The oppositionist in me tells me immediately that one may have a seemingly homogeneous text (no division into stanzas), which will flow and flow. I still believe that it has to consist of small portions etc, but it would be done in a discrete way.

So, examples, ... I could certainly write and write, but for motivation. But I'll look around.

Oooops, it's 8:30am already.

Thank you, Angeline, best regards,

Senna Jawa

PS. Angeline, thank you for the "Blue Moon"!

 

[wildsweetone]

i never thought of looking purposely beyond the obvious in the haiku. it is all there in the subconscious, those 'emotions' that we bring forth from the concrete images we have been given. i don't consciously make note of them, but they do colour my thinking, my understanding.

you have me wondering about life beneath ponds, life behind water reflections. hmm much food for thought.

thank you, Senna.

 

[Senna Jawa]

i never thought of looking purposely beyond the obvious in the haiku. it is all there in the subconscious, those 'emotions' that we bring forth from the concrete images we have been given. i don't consciously make note of them, but they do colour my thinking, my understanding.

When a poem admits multiple interpretations then, in the haiku world, we say that this poem is suggestive (which is a good thing). It is worthwhile in such a context to consider the more detailed notions: interpretation, association, provocation.

you have me wondering about life beneath ponds, life behind water reflections. hmm much food for thought.

thank you, Senna.

I hope you are not prone to epilepsy Thank you, and Angeline, for the rose. I'd like to give the two of you chocolates (sorry for not supplying a respective icon).

Best regards,

 

[Angeline]

When a poem admits multiple interpretations then, in the haiku world, we say that this poem is suggestive (which is a good think). It is worthwhile in such a context to consider the more detailed notions: interpretation, association, provocation.

I hope you are not prone to epilepsy Thank you, and Angeline, for the rose. I'd like to give the two of you chocolates (sorry for not supplying a respective icon).

Best regards,

in a purple box
four paper cups
three chocolates

Like that? Does that fit the criteria you explain? It supplies part of the story; the reader can suppose what happened to the fourth chocolate, yes? Maybe not a good example, but I am trying to understand and I think small steps are best.

 

[WickedEve]

in a purple box
four paper cups
three chocolates

Like that? Does that fit the criteria you explain? It supplies part of the story; the reader can suppose what happened to the fourth chocolate, yes? Maybe not a good example, but I am trying to understand and I think small steps are best.

For some silly reason it didn't dawn on me that the the cups and chocolates had anything in common with each other. I was more focused on the purple box and not the contents or what amounts there are of each. But now that you mention it... You ate the 4th chocolate.

After reading this thread this morning, I took a walk and made some observations. I wrote this and it probably has nothing to do with what the thread is about. I just don't know. lol

down coat
gray white sky
wild ducks fly southward

 

[Angeline]

For some silly reason it didn't dawn on me that the the cups and chocolates had anything in common with each other. I was more focused on the purple box and not the contents or what amounts there are of each. But now that you mention it... You ate the 4th chocolate.

After reading this thread this morning, I took a walk and made some observations. I wrote this and it probably has nothing to do with what the thread is about. I just don't know. lol

down coat
gray white sky
wild ducks fly southward

I only said cups cause I couldn't think of the word for those little paper things the chocolates are in. What are they called? (Don't you dare say cups, lol). Your down coat made me think the ducks are flying away before you pluck them for a matching jacket.

Senna, if we're mucking up your thread, tell me and I'll move my posts.

 

[WickedEve]

I only said cups cause I couldn't think of the word for those little paper things the chocolates are in. What are they called? (Don't you dare say cups, lol). Your down coat made me think the ducks are flying away before you pluck them for a matching jacket.

Senna, if we're mucking up your thread, tell me and I'll move my posts.

Ohhh, I think they are cups. I'm not sure. I think cups is what threw me off. Maybe call them paper wraps?

 

[Tathagata]

Now the other classic. I will give you what G.W.Henderson says is the literal translation--in my opinion it is the best:

old pond
frog jump-in
water sound
​

Basho
​

The image, the scene, the moment is so vivid that I will say no more. That's the author's 50%.

Now let's do the reader's part. Once again we face the most fundamental, existential questions. Is it all there is to the frog? Just the "ploosk" sound? We wink and the frog is gone?

There is (or is there?) another world under the surface of the water. Does it matter? There is no connection between our world and the frog's world under the water. we were together and we are not, not any more. Is it how we, humans, exist for each other? Just a ploosk? That's what we are to the world. The world will exist forever but we will vanish under the water (is there another world? do we come back on another shore? will it be us, who show up on that other shore?).

The frog has an entire underworld but we know nothing about it, there is no communication, there is only the death surface of the pond. And there is life all the same, with or without our recognition. We know so little!

Many haiku also use this " suddenness" to describe the moment of satori.
a lightening flash, a temple bell, cracking ice etc all can be used as a metaphor for the awakening of man escaping the world of illusion.
Where each moment is a miracle, is new, is a chance to be a part of the eternal unfolding Now.

 

[Senna Jawa]

in a purple box
four paper cups
three chocolates​

How about:

chocolate wagon --
left rear wheel missing
​

Best regards,

 

[Senna Jawa]

Many haiku also use this " suddenness" to describe the moment of satori. a lightening flash, a temple bell, cracking ice etc all can be used as a metaphor for the awakening of man escaping the world of illusion. Where each moment is a miracle, is new, is a chance to be a part of the eternal unfolding Now.

All true except that I object to the word "also", which is unfair to Basho's classical haiku. There is a difference between the real thing and the device. You are mostly describing a device or at least you are blurring the difference. In the case of device we have in effect an extension of the dictionary. Say there is the bell sound in the poem but otherwise no reason to suspect any "awaking". Now someone comes and tells us: this is about the end of illusions, it is a common device. Thus by definition the bell sound becomes a synonym of "end of illusions". When we know the extended dictionary then we can read the poem in one more way. But in the case of the Basho's two classical haiku there is no extra dictionary. It's done for real and not by a superficial device.The old pond and its surrounding can be viewed as the world, and one may think about the unseen world under the surface of the water. There is no need for any artificial, additional dictionary. It is not an artificial device.

There is a known poem by Li Bai, in which he writes about drinking alone, and flowers (petals) were falling onto his robe. Nice poem. But to Chinese there was a bit more, because they knew about their extended, poetic dictionary. Falling petals were prostitutes. There was nothing in the poem to indicate it. Indeed, why prostitutes and not memories (reminiscences)? It was a device -- one could say "the device of an extended dictionary".

Regards,

 

[Tathagata]

Basho studied Zen, I assumed the " zen dictionary" may have crept into his work.
I am probably mistaken, as I often am.

 

[Senna Jawa]

Basho studied Zen, I assumed the " zen dictionary" may have crept into his work.
I am probably mistaken, as I often am.

You are right, Basho did study Zen. And so did zillions of others. Check "Zen Poetry" or "Zen Poems of China and Japan" (both compiled, translated and edited by Lucien Stryk and Takashi Ikemoto), and you will see for yourself that zen poets did alright while zen masters wrote lousy poetry.

***

I need to make a comment on what I have written earlier.

There is nothing wrong with devices. Devices are good. Metaphors, similes, kennings, juxtapositions, anthropomorphisms, personalisations, allegories, rhymes, alliterations, ... they are all good (some are dangerous though ). And the same with the "extended dictionary". But devices themselves are not poetry. They can be used well or poorly, while above, in this thread, I have presented some of the Basho's poetry. I logically object to equating the tools and the actual art.

 

[champagne1982]

I need to make a comment on what I have written earlier.

There is nothing wrong with devices. Devices are good. Metaphors, similes, kennings, juxtapositions, anthropomorphisms, personalisations, allegories, rhymes, alliterations, ... they are all good (some are dangerous though ). And the same with the "extended dictionary". But devices themselves are not poetry. They can be used well or poorly, while above, in this thread, I have presented some of the Basho's poetry. I logically object to equating the tools and the actual art.

I don't understand your logical objection here. What makes it logic? We don't equate a portrait with the canvas or the brushes, etc... but without those tools the master would never have created the work, thus without poetic devices, the poet is left writing words for the panty drawer.

I don't see where this becomes a logical objection, especially in something as brief as haiku. The poet had best be master of all devices in order to be a master at creating strong imagery as if from nothing. My logic leads me to thinking that in poems of succinct brevity that the device does become the art out of neccessity... it's just wearing different colours of paint.

 

[UnderYourSpell]

Mirrored water
surface tension
holds no reflection.

Am I doing this right?

 

[Angeline]

Mirrored water
surface tension
holds no reflection.

Am I doing this right?

I dunno, but your av is moving.

 

[UnderYourSpell]

Wasnt that a different thread lol ? and this is a diff avatar sheeeeeesh and they say I am a dizzy blonde .....

 

[lorencino]

I don't understand your logical objection here. What makes it logic? We don't equate a portrait with the canvas or the brushes, etc... but without those tools the master would never have created the work, thus without poetic devices, the poet is left writing words for the panty drawer.

I don't see where this becomes a logical objection, especially in something as brief as haiku. The poet had best be master of all devices in order to be a master at creating strong imagery as if from nothing. My logic leads me to thinking that in poems of succinct brevity that the device does become the art out of neccessity... it's just wearing different colours of paint.

It's good to see that you are well on the road to recovery. How are you coping?

 

[Senna Jawa]

Mirrored water
surface tension
holds no reflection.
​

Am I doing this right?

Mirrored water -- a bit awkward English (to me); you are saying, I guess, that the water surface acts like a mirror. But we know it.

surface tension -- "tension" is rather abstract; I cannot see that "surface tension", how do I? It is not a vivid image to me at all. It rather sounds to me like... zillion of poems;

holds no reflection -- negation here is not something concrete; it's more vivid to give the specific things which do happen, which can be seen rather than what we do not see. It is not any iron rule, not at all, but this negative phrase doesn't sound poetic to me. And its English once again is strained, artificial (am I right?).

All together, this 3-liner seems to me forced. Despite an attempt at the image it still sounds to me like "talk". One should really provide a truly true real scene )), or you should fool me. But here I have a feeling that you are trying to be intellectual. The composition is not convincing: first you are saying "mirrored", and then that there is no reflection (you have here also a word play, which is fine, it neither makes nor breaks this text). You are trying to impose on us a view (tension kills the reflection?), instead of presenting raw image or scene, and let us (the readers) do the thinking on our own if we feel so inclined.

Please, do not feel that I am "attacking". I am grateful for your post. Best regards,