An Introduction to Haiku
Haiku (hy-koo) is a traditional Japanese verse
form, notable for its compression and suggestiveness. In three lines totaling
seventeen syllables measuring 5-7-5, a great haiku presents, through imagery
drawn from intensely careful observation, a web of associated ideas (renso)
requiring an active mind on the part of the listener. The form emerged
during the 16th century and was developed by the poet Basho (1644-1694)
into a refined medium of Buddhist and Taoist symbolism. "Haiku," Basho
was fond of saying, "is the heart of the Man'yoshu," the first imperial
anthology, compiled in the eight century. "Haiku," many modern Japanese
poets are fond of saying, "began and ended with Basho." Look beyond the
hyperbole of either observation, and there is a powerful element of truth.
Traditionally and ideally, a haiku presents a pair of contrasting images,
one suggestive of time and place, the other a vivid but fleeting observation.
Working together, they evoke mood and emotion. The poet does not comment
on the connection but leaves the synthesis of the two images for the reader
to perceive. A haiku by Basho, considered to have written the most perfect
examples of the form, illustrates this duality:
Now the swinging bridge
Is quieted with creepers
Like our tendrilled life
When Basho writes:
How reluctantly
the bee emerges from deep
within the peony
is he merely presenting a pathetical fallacy, attributing human
emotion to a bee, or is he entering into the authentic experience of "beeness"
as deeply as possible? Perhaps both qualities are present. His detailed
observation calls for something other than metaphor; it demands literal
accuracy. Is the bee inside his mind or outside? The poem moves in part
because of tension raised through the underlying question of duality the
Zen resolves in silence. The bee, the peony, the poet, all one idea composed
of many.
In another poem, Basho finds
Delight, then sorrow,
aboard the cormorant
fishing boat
without having to describe for his audience the nooses tied around the
throats of fishing birds to inhibit swallowing. He is initially delighted
by their amazing skill and grace, then horrified that they cannot swallow
what they catch, saddened by their captivity and exploitation, and perhaps
even more deeply saddened by the fishing folk he never mentions. What remains
unstated begs for a profound moral equation, although only the poet's compassion
is clearly implied.
The best haiku reflect an undeniable Zen influence.
It evolved from the earlier linked-verse form known as the renga
and was used extensively by Zen Buddhist monks in the 15th and 16th centuries.
In the next 200 years, the verse form achieved its greatest popularity
and success. Elements of compassion, silence, and awareness of temporality
often combine to reveal a sense of mystery. Just as often, haiku may bring
a startling insight into the ordinary, as when Buson writes:
Nobly, the great priest
deposits his daily stool
in bleak winter fields
thereby reminding his audience that nobility has nothing whatever to
do with palaces and embroided robes, but that true nobility is obtainable
in every human endeavor.
Issa reminds the attentive listener:
A world of dew,
and within every dewdrop
a world of struggle
Haiku may be the most widely recognizable poetic
form in the world. At play with the form, children quickly discover their
own poetic imaginations; almost anyone can learn to make decently readable
haiku in no time at all. Just as anyone can learn to write a quatrain or
sonnet. The problem remains: to be great, a poem must rise on its own merit,
and too much haiku is merely haiku. Haiku written in American English and
attempting to borrow traditional Japanese literacy devices usually ends
up smelling of the bric-a-brac shop, all fragmentary dust and mold or cheap
glitter coating the ordinary, or worse, the merely cute or contrived. Great
haiku cuts both ways, sometimes witty or sarcastic, sometimes making Zen
like demands for that most extraordinary consciousness, no-mind or ordinary
mind.
Haiku should be approached with a daily sort
of reverence, as we might approach an encounter with a great spiritual
teacher. It is easy to imitate; it is difficult to attain. The more deeply
the reader enters into the authentic experience of the poem, the more the
poem reveals. When Kikaku writes:
In the Emperor's bed,
the smell of burnt mosquitoes,
and erotic whispers
we must realize first that the burning of mosquitoes clears the air
for erotic play; then we may wonder whether the "smell of burnt mosquitoes"
might become a kind of erotic incense for the Emperor, a stimulant for
his lust. Thus, lust, love and death are joined in primal experience. Is
there a buried needle in this verse? Does Kikaku intend for us to think
critically of a decadent emperor? And what does that reveal about ourselves?
Revealing the relationship between these mundane activities shakes up our
polite perceptions like a Zen slap in the face, a call to awaken to what
actually is.
Haiku, sprung free from the opening lines of
predominantly humorous "linked verse" (renga) created by multiple
authors, began to articulate aesthetic qualities such as a sense of beautiful
aloneness, sabishisa, and restrained elegance, furyu.
The precise and concise nature of haiku
influenced the early 20th-century Anglo-American poetic movement known
as imagism. The writing of haiku is still practiced by thousands of Japanese
who annually publish outstanding examples in the many magazines devoted
to the art. The great age of haiku spans only a little over a hundred years,
and yet its poetry is a river that continues to flow. In our own age and
language, wonderful haiku have been written by poets as diverse as Gary
Snyder, Richard Wilbur, Lew Welch and Richard Wright, to name but a few.
In addition to Basho, important haiku poets include Yosa Buson, Kobayashi
Issa, and Masuoka Shiki. Basho is neither the beginning nor the end. Re-encountering
these poems is like the leap of Basho's famous frog, a plunge into the
sound of water, each brief poem expanding in ever-widening ripples.
Bibliography: Blyth, R. H., A History of Haiku, 2 vols.
(1963-64); Higginson, W. J., The Haiku Handbook (1985; repr. 1992);
Reichhold, J., A Dictionary of Haiku (1991); Hamill, Sam, The Sound
of Water (1995).