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Roadrunner Issue X: 1 • The Scorpion Prize #19 by Marjorie Perloff • ku • Masks III • Shinsen 21 (a sampling) translated by Fay Aoyagi • Yasui Kōji translated by Eric Selland • Favorites from 2009 by the editors Scott Metz Editor Paul Pfleuger Jr AssistantEditor “water lenses” by masako © 2010 ISSN 1933-7337 “serqet” by r’r’r © 2010 The Scorpion Prize #19 In my view, a good haiku should observe, if not the 5-7-5 syllabic pattern, at least the three-line form, and its diction should exemplify the mot juste—the exact word required by the context. There should be an element of surprise, and the sound structure should be as tight and complex as possible. In view of these criteria, my first choice is: a face beseeching before it becomes a water lily George Swede Usually, one first sees the water lily and then reads a face into it. But here the poet confronts the face itself first, and “sees” it that way for only a moment before it turns into a water lily. And “beseeching” is a good participle in the context: water lilies can’t beseech, of course, but once brought to life, they can and do. At the sound level, Swede’s 5-5-5- pattern works nicely: we expect change, “becom[ing,” but here what changes remains the same, thus confounding the reader. There are four other haiku that I liked very much for similar reasons: a few grains of sugar at the edge of the fire slowly smoking Chris Gordon One expects to meet a few grains of carbon here or perhaps particles of food, cooked on the fire. But the few grains of sugar are a surprise: the references makes us look closely at that fire, slowly smoking. look up into the pure blue death of clouds John Sandbach Here the key word is “death,” a sort of shock since we’re expecting “sky” or even “breath.” But look how accurate: the death of the clouds produces blue sky. white wind where in the word is the world? Lorin Ford This one gets high marks for tight sound structure and reversal of word/world so as to deconstruct the cliché phrase, “Where in the world....?” Here the world is contained in the word. Poetry contains its own world—verbal, sonic, syntactic. And the word contains paragramms, puns, etc. the silence grows teeth—a tree with cracked windows Scott Metz Metz is an editor of Roadrunner, so is not eligible to win. But it deserves praise for its subtle metaphor: first silence (an abstraction) is animated—it grows teeth; then, in a reversal, the natural (tree) takes on aspects of the man-made, with its “cracked windows.” The natural is subsumed under the unnatural. And even here there is no refuge for the larger silence outside. All of the above are excellent, so it was difficult to take sides. But the water lily haiku is, in my experiences, unique and hence special. Marjorie Perloff Marjorie Perloff is Sadie D. Patek Professor Emerita of Humanities at Stanford University and currently Scholar-in-Residence at the University of Southern California. She teaches courses and writes on twentieth—and now twenty-first—century poetry and poetics, both Anglo-American and from a Comparatist perspective, as well as on intermedia and the visual arts. Her first three books dealt with individual poets—Yeats, Robert Lowell, and Frank O’Hara; she then published The Poetics of Indeterminacy: Rimbaud to Cage (1981), a book that has gone through a number of editions, and led to her extensive exploration of avant-garde art movements in The Futurist Moment: Avant-Garde, Avant-Guerre, and the Language of Rupture (1986, new edition, 1994), and subsequent books (13 in all), the most recent of which is Differentials: Poetry, Poetics, Pedagogy (2005). Radical Artifice: Writing Poetry in the Age of Media (1992) has been used in classrooms studying the “new” digital poetics, and 21st Century Modernism (Blackwell 2002) is a manifesto of Modernist Survival. Wittgenstein’s Ladder brought philosophy into the mix; it has recently been translated into Portuguese (Sao Paulo), Spanish (Mexico), and Slovenian and will be translated in France for 2010 publication. Perloff has recently published her cultural memoir The Vienna Paradox (2004), which has been widely discussed. The Sound of Poetry / The Poetry of Sound, coedited with Craig Dworkin has just been published by Chicago (2009), and UNORIGINAL GENIUS: Poetry by Other Means in the Twenty-First Century, is due out from U of Chicago Press, 2010. She has been a frequent reviewer for periodicals from TLS and The Washing- ton Post to all the major scholarly journals, and she has lectured at most major universities in the U.S. and at European, Asian, and Latin American universities and festivals. She was recently the Weidenfeld Professor of European Literature at Oxford University. Perloff has held Guggenheim, NEH, and Huntington fellowships, served on the Advisory Board of the Stanford Humanities Center, and has recently completed her year as President of the Modern Language Association. She is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and recently was named Honorary Foreign Professor at the Beijing Modern Languages University. She received an Honorary Degree, Doctor of Letters, from Bard College in May 2008. For further information, see http:// marjorieperloff.com Roadrunner X:1 Copyright © 2010. All rights reserved by the respective authors. X:1 ku drowning with Icarus in the textbook print Peggy Willis Lyles bleeding under my skin the American dream Eve Luckring photos from Abu Ghraib broken blood vessels in my left brain Eve Luckring the old names for countries levitating the Pentagon Eve Luckring between our countries a knife patrols, sharpening its only thought Peter Yovu October the red shift you were buried in Peter Yovu the furnace starts up in darkness the baby I was puts on its bronze shoes Peter Yovu My voice carries on the wind and eventually turns into whisper. Elena Peterson between the walls of the Athenaeum nothing Dietmar Tauchner the lighthouse invites the storm then lights it Malcolm Lowry (Garry Eaton) All of the past days Three figure temperatures And great thunder storms Paris Flammonde I sweep the sky with my eyes Assemble pieces And make a perfect picture. Paris Flammonde down to the last line dusk slides off the table Rob Scott say it so it sounds like starling she says Chris Gordon when I least expect it you open your robe Chris Gordon things I did with my hand show up as dead skin Chris Gordon the same conclusion vomit in the flower pot Chris Gordon apology moon tonight the word is ‘meniscus’ Cherie Hunter Day they tie string to the tails of dragonflies the girls of Aomori Patrick Sweeney a sudden fish-like dart my womb tilts in balance _kala baby shoes one mind bends after another Michele Harvey When you dream the inside smoke between cypress trees Richard Gilbert Stay with me with the light out and water glass Richard Gilbert Please feel free to stay here there’s a system you always said that Richard Gilbert Nunavik's moon out of sight, its ulu still in my heart Chen-ou Liu that side of the thin tree gathered cadences Susan Diridoni just east of our troubles the rainbow’s face Susan Diridoni pocket ing one chip gravel for this whole road john martone winters my house-spider friends john martone Headless rabbit at the bottom of all things lies something else Mike Andrelczyk so dark your candle floats in a sentence Gregory Hopkins a hierarchy of apples in the moonlight Fay Aoyagi the moon × the moon ÷ the moon Fay Aoyagi A breathing space with the gutters dripping light 呼吸的空間 伴著排水溝 滴落的光線 In the doorway leaves on either side of the brain 門口 樹葉在大腦的兩邊 At which point it revolves around the baby’s heart 在這點上 繞著這嬰孩的心藏轉 I’m a documentary of that blizzard I’m half true 我是那大風雪的紀錄片 我半真半假 Paul Pfleuger Jr. nor the factory's weight or the wind through the firs the heat’s gone to the pine’s head one by one they fly to see it broken the dawn the roses had in mind never comes together Scott Metz Roadrunner X:1 Copyright © 2010. All rights reserved by the respective authors and artists. MASKS I I I wayo bo Ms. WestonSuperMare Paris Flammonde Bridghost eyesa Clarrideau Knox Rigel Knox Chef Arnold Grayhull C. Flor Kwahi Front Natsuki giovù Emmi Gnusec Bird Cage Escot Feinour Jack Dander THE DOMINO AWARD 2 all the sticks sharpened differently the moon has stained your gloves Jack Dander blue apple productions black fox studios contact [email protected] links black fox studios http://blackfoxstudios.wordpress.com/ The Domino Award http://TheDominoAward.wordpress.com/ lakes & now wolves http://lakesandnowwolves.wordpress.com/ ant ant ant ant ant http://antantantantant.wordpress.com/ MASKS III April 2010 http://www.roadrunnerjournal.net/ Creative Commons 3.0 Licensed Freely download, share & copy; not for commercial gain. Shinsen 21 (a sampling) edited by Bansei Tsukushi Yasuko Tsushima Leona Takayama & You-shorin (Nagano, Japan, December 2009) selected & translated by Fay Aoyagi Shinsen 21 (New Selection 21) is a new haiku anthology featuring 21 Japanese poets who are all under 40 years of age (born after 1968), and who did not publish his/her first haiku collection, or win any haiku awards, before the year 2000, thus showcasing voices of the 21st century. The anthology features a selection of 100 haiku by each poet; each selection is then followed by a short essay by someone under 45 years of age. The anthology concludes with a roundtable discussion that includes three of the editors and haiku poet Minoru Ozawa (born in 1956, and winner of the 2005 Yomiuri Prize for Literature [Haiku/Poetry]). The following sample of the anthology was selected and translated by Fay Aoyagi and originally presented on her blog, Blue Willow Haiku World <http://fayaoyagi.wordpress.com/>. For this special presentation, some of the translations have been revised and a few new ones added. Special thanks to You-shorin Publishing Company, the editors, & especially the poets of Shinsen 21 for granting Roadrunner permission to republish this work in English Copyright © 2010. All rights reserved by the respective authors. むかしには黄色い凧を浮かべたる 鴇田智哉 mukashi niwa ki’iroi tako o ukabetaru for the past I let a yellow kite float Tomoya Tokita 空のすぐうしろに咳の聞えたる 鴇田智哉 sora no sugu ushiro ni seki no kikoetaru right behind the sky I hear someone coughing Tomoya Tokita 鳴り出して電話になりぬ春の闇 山口優夢 Yuumu Yamaguchi naridashite denwa ni narinu haru no yami spring darkness starts to ring and becomes a telephone call 蝋燭を蝋燭立てに置く手套 山口優夢 Yuumu Yamaguchi rôsoku o rôsoku-tate ni oku shutô a gloved hand placing a candle in the candle stand 気絶して千年凍る鯨かな 冨田拓也 Takuya Tomita kizetsu shite sen’nen kôru kujira kana fainted a whale freezes for one thousand years 卵てふ億年の闇冬灯 冨田拓也 tamago chô okunen no yami fuyu-tomoshi an egg is the darkness of one hundred million years— a winter light Takuya Tomita 白骨の反りと冬虹と揺らげよ 九堂夜想 hakkotsu no sori to fuyu-niji to yurageyo arched white bones and a winter rainbow sway! Yasou Kudou 冬すみれ人は小さき火を運ぶ 田中亜美 Ami Tanaka fuyu-sumire hito wa chiisaki hi o hakobu winter violet she carries a tiny fire 歩きだす椅子歩き出さない冬の猫 中村安伸 Yasunobu Nakamura arukidasu isu arukidasanai fuyu no neko a chair starts to walk a winter cat does not start to walk 寂しさも僕の衛星冬の蠅 豊里友行 Tomoyuki Toyozato sabishisa mo boku no eisei fuyu no hae loneliness too is my satellite— a winter fly 雪らしい生理が遅れてゐるらしい 北大路 翼 Tsubasa Kitaohji yuki rashii seiri ga okurete iru rashii I hear snow will fall I hear her period is late 木枯しの壊しては組む星座かな 村上鞆彦 kogarashi no kowashitewa kumu seiza kana a winter gust demolishes and constructs the constellation Tomohiko Murakami ことごとく未踏なりけり冬の星 髙柳克弘 Katsuhiro Takayanagi kotogotoku mitô narikeri fuyu no hoshi none of them have been landed on— winter stars めくれつつ雑誌燃えゐる焚火かな 中本真人 mekuretsutsu zasshi moeiru takibi kana its pages turning over a magazine burns in the bonfire Masato Nakamoto 梟やいずれの道も帰路ならず 神野紗希 fukurô ya izureno michi mo kiro narazu an owl— every road is not a road to home Saki Kouno 太古より仲間集まる日向ぼこ 外山一機 Kazuki Toyama taiko yori nakama atsumaru hinataboko from prehistoric times my buddies gather to bathe in the winter sun 洞ひとつ抱へてをりぬ冬桜 谷 雄介 hora hitotsu kakaeteorinu fuyu-zakura it’s carrying a hollow winter cherry tree Yusuke Tani 牡蠣噛めば窓なき部屋のごときかな 佐藤文香 kaki kameba mado naki heya no gotoki kana chewing an oyster it’s like a room without windows Ayaka Sato 時計から時間生るる冬の蝶 越智友亮 tokei kara jikan umaruru fuyu no chô time is born from the clock— a winter butterfly Yusuke Ochi 滝壺に届かざるまま凍りけり 五十嵐義知 takitsubo ni todokazaru mama kôrikeri its shape before reaching the bottom a frozen waterfall Yoshitomo Igarashi 薄氷の割れて人魚の鱗かな 矢野玲奈 usurai no warete ningyo no uroko kana thinning ice broken . . . and a mermaid’s scale Reina Yano 秋風や汝の臍に何植ゑん 藤田哲史 akikaze ya nanji no hozo ni nani uen autumn wind— what I should plant in your belly button Satoshi Fujita 紐あれば結界となる秋の暮 藤田哲史 Satoshi Fujita himo areba kekkai to naru aki no kure a string will mark a boundary of the sacred place autumn dusk 東京といふ語は光る羽蟻の夜 相子智恵 Chie Aiko tôkyô to iu go wa hikaru ha’ari no yo the word “Tokyo” shines a night of winged ants 火星にも水や蚕の糸吐く夜 相子智恵 Chie Aiko kasei nimo mizu ya kaiko no ito haku yo Mars, too, has water— a night when silkworms spit out strings 眞青ナル文盲ノ魚飛ビ交ヘリ 関 悦史 masao naru monmô no uo tobikaeri blue illiterate fish flying around Etsushi Seki 蟻のよるグランドピアノたる私 関 悦史 ari no yoru gurando piano taru watakushi ants gather at a grand piano which is me Etsushi Seki まだ夢を見てゐる牡蠣を食ひにけり 関 悦史 Etsushi Seki mada yume o miteiru kaki o kuinikeri I eat an oyster it is still dreaming 20 Haiku by Kōji Yasui 安井 浩司 translated by Eric Selland Kōji Yasui (安井 浩司) was born in Akita, Japan, in 1936. He studied haiku under Koui Nagata. While still in his teens, he became a member of the haiku magazine Bokuyoshin, edited by Shuji Terayama. He is a member of the Riraza Group, Haiku-hyoron, and Unicorn. He is currently a member of the Ki group (information courtesy of World Haiku Association). The poems presented here have been extracted from an essay entitled Ban’ya Natsuishi and Kōji Yasui by Sayumi Kamakura, which was originally published in Kokubungaku (Gakutōsha, Dec. 2008 special edition). Roadrunner X:1 Copyright © 2010. All rights reserved by the respective authors. 氷柱苛立ちわたしの内臓透けて見える The column of ice irritated You can see right through To my insides 渚で鳴る巻貝有機質は死して Sounding on the beach Trumpet shells Organic matter in their death ひるすぎの小屋を壊せばみなすすき The old shack in the afternoon After tearing it down Nothing left but grass and weeds 死鼠をのまひるへ抛りけり Tossed the dead rat Into eternal daylight 何を恐れて闇に青梅撒きちらす What is it that frightens Scattering unripe plums In the darkness 汝が犬の入る門へとはいるべし Thou shalt enter by the gate Where the dog enters となるため声を検約する草ら The grass saves up its voice For the coming north wind 西の空に龍重体となる美しき In the western sky Beauty like a sick dragon 或る青空醜い棒へ車輪嵌める Under a blue sky The automobile’s tires Ensnare an ugly stick 藁塚の父をしめらしゆく雁列 A column of geese On its way to moisten My father on a mound of straw 椿の花いきなり数を廃棄せり Camellias— All of a sudden Discarding their numbers をふたたびみれば岬かな Seeing grandfather again The promontory 遠い煙が白瓜抱いて昇るらん Distant smoke Bears a white gourd In its ascent に散りたきさるすべり崖上に The crape myrtle on the shore Wants its flowers to fall eternally 夕顔の水をかせて寂しけれ The moonflower’s sadness At emptying its water 鷲の眼の高さと広さに我はいず I am not The height and breadth Of the eagle’s eye 火のほとり水は流れて秋の家 Water flows By the fire The house in autumn 牛の背に二人抱き合う春 On the back of a cow Two children embracing Spring & Two more by Kōji Yasui translated by Eric Selland 山中孤塔に瞳のような窓入れけり A window cut Like an eye In the lonely mountain tower 膝の辺りに宇宙菫の落下して Around the knees A cosmic violet Falling Well hello all, The good year 2009 brought to Roadrunner a diverse range of voices that we are proud to serve as a platform for. Over winter break, we mulled over the possibility of putting together something of a ‘best-of ’ for the year with commentary and the like. “How many ku to include?” we asked. 25? 15? 10? The thought of having to exclude a number of works was nearly enough to leave the idea in the bin, but we decided to move forward with ten that each of us has selected and will say a little about. We can relate to the challenges before each issue’s judge of the Scorpion Prize. It’s no small thing with so much strong work being published, but we’ll take a crack at it. We see these selections as being both representative of the range of haiku/senryu that Roadrunner has to offer and, hell, just darn good. Hopefully they are not too idiosyncratic, but they should give a sense of what moves us most. We’d like to express our gratitude and appreciation to all the poets that make us who we are. Special thanks to all of the contributors: Hiroaki Sato (where does he find the time?!), William Ramsey, Richard Gilbert, David G. Lanoue & Philip Rowland. And many thanks to our 2009 Scorpion Prize judges—Matthew Dickman, Richard Gilbert, Ron Silliman, & Don Wentworth—for their willingness to participate, their time, their thoughtful words, and careful choices. Thanks to all! Please re-enjoy! Paul Pfleuger, Jr. ❦ Paul’s sun on the horizon who first picked up a stone paul m. Along this horizon paul m. depicts, the sun could very well be rising, and sets up, in the two lines that follow it, a clean, clear image. Though no punctuation is used, there is a kireji-like cut after “horizon” that asks one to peer in. It’s striking to me that the second line utilizes a somewhat similar, yet more subtle, technique which asks as much of a reader, yet it doesn’t disrupt the fluidity and movement. Where it ends with “stone,” much room is left for interpretation and contemplation. There, among the stones, even the most ordinary or mundane of landscapes might instantaneously be transformed into something of a great savannah at that moment where man first picked up a stone and human technology began. One might also find the biblical allusion to Jesus and the woman taken in adultery in John 7:53-8:11, where Jesus tells the mob that threatened to stone the woman for having committed adultery, “He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her.” Of course, the possibilities do not end there, and much depends on how a reader opts to read it. There is much space for readers to enter and reenter. We’re able to linger long with this one. It’s a strong haiku of substantial depth. ❦ slammed by salt and sun the paint has no chance in this mexican prison David Caruso The paint’s chances make this. Caruso effectively renders it unable to serve its functional and aesthetic purposes. In at least one reading, the chance the paint has been given infuses it with a living quality, and personifies it. Egad, hasn’t the poet broken a rule here? No worries. Paying any attention to that might have resulted in a less than compelling haiku. It adds layers of nuance. The poet still vividly depicts a moment with an image that makes good use of suggestion and implication; and it has an objective feel about it. From that slam at the beginning to its end, it brings to mind the brutal and unforgiving conditions of the Mexican correctional system, which has received a bit of news coverage in recent years, but nothing is overstated. The two-line construction seems utterly perfect for conveying the tone, as well as the rapidity of the machine gun’s firing, when reading the last line the way it stands. ❦ Job’s-tears in my hands a typhoon gathers strength Dhugal Lindsay Curious and peculiar, it goes without saying that much depends on the reader and what he or she brings with them to this challenging haiku. Ending the first line where Lindsay does, rather than at “hands,” opens it up to different interpretive possibilities. Living in Taiwan, I can attest to having heard on more than a few occasions of how beneficial to one’s health edible Job’s-tears are. It can be bought around the corner, as oriental medicine and restaurants that include it as an ingredient in certain dishes are scattered about. It is evident how associations might be drawn to health and even potency in Lindsay’s haiku. The tear-like seed pods are used in many places for making jewelry, and are also used for rosary beads. Of course, there could be at least a loose allusion to the tribulations of the biblical figure. The contrast brought to the fore is particularly intriguing when the small, hard seeds held in the palm are juxtaposed against the vast area and awesome might of a typhoon picking up speed, gathering strength. ❦ A body of light Making room For a pillar of steel Jack Galmitz First off, there may be sexual connotations as Jack Galmitz could be metaphorically expressing a romantic union of lovers. Perhaps that “pillar of steel” represents his sturdy lover, his rock. Yet, knowing that the poet is a Buddhist, I wonder if the first line refers to the state arrived at when one sees the body much differently than we normally do during the routine of our everyday lives, and, instead, as some transitory form or inglorious container, something different from the mind. I imagine there is an inner-soundness that comes with that. The third line is provocative. We have ‘steel’ which can be taken as a symbol for strength, durability, resistance or strength, but connections drawn to the body of light—as with several of the Roadrunner ku of note that we have selected from 2009—are left for readers to engage, to unravel. Overall, I’d say I’m taken both by the way this arrives at some kind of an equilibrium and the majestic sounding of it. A wonderful poem. ❦ their wings like cellophane remember cellophane Lorin Ford For me, this could end with a sigh or a snicker. The rhythm makes it a sound fit for one-line. Bee or fly wings lead to a surprising reflection. Lorin Ford injects the poem with an ironic nostalgia in the way it contemplates what can be seen as a consumerist symbol of last century, when cellophane was a staple in most homes. It’s making a comeback, by the way, being that it is biodegradable. I digress. The exclusion of the question mark allows for ambiguity, further interpretation. And the simile (yes, a simile in haiku) is spot-on. A timely haiku that is penetrating on many levels. ❦ honeysuckle taking down the spite fence Peggy Willis Lyles Another solid offering, rich in many ways, from Peggy Willis Lyles. Could the honeysuckle be climbing all about and covering the fence, giving the illusion that it is being taken over as it grows, oblivious to that border separating neighbors (it seems to recall the Old South)? Or is it just the poignant scent of the honeysuckle as the fence is literally being taken down? A perfect objective sketching? Not so fast. Without the punctuation, or an explicit cutting, at least one reading personifies the honeysuckle and sees it bringing down that spite fence. At any rate, room is left for interpretation and we’re able to linger here awhile. Haiku such as these, like that honeysuckle, cross boundaries and this one might have found itself a home in a number of journals. I also see it as a testament to Roadrunner’s range, and we’re delighted that it ended up here. ❦ look up into the pure blue death of clouds John Sandbach This one grew on me after several readings. At first, the tone appeared insistent and statement-like, sharp—perhaps too strong and imposing, I thought, as he appeared to be commanding us to face up there, above us, to an eventuality that can be seen as both comforting and disturbing at the same time. It’s not something we can do every day. Then I asked who it might be directed toward, who is being told to gaze into this sky. It might be an example, a ‘first thought, best thought’ haiku (well, senryu), and I see it being something of a poet’s note-to-self, a reminder to retreat from the rat-race and slow down in order to take in the idea of death, of permanent absence from this world that is there to ponder when one looks hard enough into the blue heavens. That “pure blue death” adds a certain existential charm to it and also seems to remind the poet and readers of the ephemerality of our time in this world. I like to think that it is the minor voice, the poet’s speaking small to himself, that is heard and, ultimately, speaks to its audience. ❦ in and out of meaning a finned word minnows Peter Yovu Pardon the pun here, but I see Peter Yovu as a sort of ‘fisher of men’ in recent years. He’s taking chances, and there is gusto in his work. This is by no means a typical haiku. It shows and tells. I find that telling conveying a tension or instability in language. “A finned word” could be in reference to the written word, rather than the spoken. It is my impulse to say that it is the former here, although it’s not stated. The first line could imply an active search for meaning, and while a context might be imagined, the unspecified location adds to the unease of this peculiar experience and how it is to be expressed. It’s not kigo-less (minnows: spring), but are these minnows in their natural habitat? Is this a bait shop? Is it a day spent fishing? Or is Yovu offering minnows as an intriguing metaphorical verb? These things matter to a certain degree, as they color reader interpretations, but it also leaves a good deal up to the imagination, and I like that about this poem. I’m convinced that it communicates a subtle restlessness toward the notion of haiku as merely reportage—telling objectively some here-and-now realization found in the world—when it is often not entirely that simple; and, personally, I find it difficult, on occasion, to remain true to myself when conveying these moments of clarity, joy, confusion, what have you, that we come across, without including elements that might tend to be seen as fantastical or obscure. “A finned word” also effectively conveys the elusive qualities of language in the way it sometimes gets away, like a shimmering minnow would, from our field of vision; I don’t see it being an accident that ‘meaning’ and ‘minnows’ alliterate. Think of times that one word or line shimmered away before you had a chance to pencil it down into a notebook or the closest piece of paper. How intriguingly ironic it is that the end result—this fractured snapshot of experience—stands as something intensely meaningful. ❦ I see the iris and its stamina and am blue Charles Trumbull Sentimental? Perhaps, but not gushingly so, and it works here. There is so much depth behind the seeming simplicity of this poem which makes it a gem. I am reminded here of something the American poet Archibald MacLeish said in his ‘Ars Poetica’: "A poem should not mean. But be." The resilience of an iris in its full bloom—however ephemeral it may be—is astonishing and humbling, particularly in our exhausted moments; and I can’t help but think that this was written around the time Trumbull, Modern Haiku’s editor, was moving from Illinois to New Mexico, when there would have no doubt been loads of packing, preparations and running back and forth going on. There’s something about the repetition of “and,” and I feel much hinges on this. In addition to the assonance—depending how one sounds it (try grumbling it!)—I find it lends a touch of humor to the experience crafted by one of our finest poets. ❦ under the nitrogen blue sky the white horse of my life Patrick Sweeney We may instantly recall a number of storybook tales ending happily with a knight or a prince charming riding in on a white horse. We may think of gods riding chariots drawn by white horses, or the Book of Revelation (19:11-16), where Christ appears as the Word of God. A white horse as a symbol has no shortage of meanings. If it is, in fact, a metaphor, it’s unpretentious. “The white horse” could represent someone or thing that rescued or completes the poet—a lover, a child, a friend, a place. Regarding the latter, years ago, it was mountains that set me straight, and I don’t see it being too far of a stretch to see the likeness between snowcapped mountain humps bearing resemblance to a white horse. And there are literally White Horse Mountains that I know of in China (Yunnan and Zhejiang provinces), America (California), in Japan (Nagano Prefecture), and there may be others. We know Patrick Sweeney lives in Japan. Just a thought. At any rate, this is an exceptional offering from a poet who also included several other strong ku inside Roadrunner in 2009. ❦ Scott’s the crow in the road refuses to move a thunderstorm at dusk Chris Gordon Roadrunner published many ku by Chris in 2009, many of which played with more recherché materials; and yet, i am drawn each time back to this one for its seeming simplicity in imagery, and yet its oddness and freshness in presenting them. Simply put: the ku has great power for me, great magnetism, and i think this is because the poet uses animism in such a dynamic and playful way. Also, he surprises us with his choice of line breaks and lack of punctuation, where a different poet may have forced meaning and a particular, singular, reading upon us; Chris, instead, allows multiple and simultaneous readings to occur, all of which are bold, dark, supernatural, and rather unnerving. ❦ A candle is a sweet machine to fly across the crowshaped night Grant Hackett This is wild; beautiful, crazy and wild. The imagery is just amazing, surreal, dream-like, mythological. It is not only about movement, but the need for movement, for flight, for change. Not only is the poet in motion, on an odyssey, but the night, animated, is too. And it all seems to be spontaneous, brought on by something unknown and undetermined (so inviting for me as a reader). In the dreamscape of the poem, the night is “crow-shaped,” giving it an intense, sinister edge; and though this invokes darkness, it also, regarding motion, establishes a connection and parallelism with the poet and “i” of the ku: they are both traveling, transforming together, almost as one, simultaneously. . . . i love the playfulness of light v. dark, fact/factual simile (“is”) v. metaphor. Wonderful implications. The ku bursts with an almost child-like sense of adventure, and excitement, and is contagious for me. ❦ places for the ocean to end ― his birthday no longer a party Gary Hotham What are these “places”? i feel i want to be one of them; in fact, even more so, i want everyone to be one of those places, to be open and inviting, to have that strength to hold such substantialness. Of course, those “places” could be much more concrete, specific, local, non-human, and, down through the centuries, for this or that tribe/country/culture, sacred. Ultimately though, the lingering emotion here for me is sadness (“to end”); and yet, it doesn’t necessarily have to end there; perhaps it’s just a new beginning. In which case, the emotions are mixed; and complicated. The last line invokes sadness as well though, but also longing, even (non cringe-worthy) nostalgia. Is it the corporatization of the world the poet laments? (i think of Jesus, the season being the end of the year/ Xmas). The diminishment and fading of spirituality, love, celebration, sacredness? Whatever the case, these are the ideas i find myself contemplating. Combined, the ku’s two parts create new emotions to be deeply felt—something about vastness and greatness are being questioned, recalibrated, and placed back upon the reader and their own concept of the sacred. ❦ opening her robe against forgetting distant music Michael McClintock Instead of closing something, blocking something off in order to forget, or start over, the opposite is offered to us here: an opening up. With this, we are swept into a stream (a flood?) of need, desire, wanting, longing, freedom, all mixed up into a cocktail of memory that is tantalizingly, invitingly, knowingly, offered. Is she the one opening her own robe—intimacy shown through the watcher’s/lover’s knowing of the whys (something they just got finished discussing: how it used to be)? Or is it the poet who is acting on her, doing the opening (which leads to other openings), trying all they can to bring back the love s/he once experienced? The level of intimacy is to be determined: is the “distant music” something the couple once had together, and are trying to re-ignite? Or is it “distant music” remembered with others?—passion, spontaneity, and intensity experienced with someone else, or numerous others? Music is always more than just music. Even when it is dissonant, difficult, or dark, it is still music. In this poem though, the music is bright, happy, full of light. And it is intense. The longing is hard and immediate though—an absolute need and desire for it. And it must happen now. It must be extinguished, and reborn. The ku spins on the word “against.” ❦ close to someone in the stars white seeps inward Marlene Mountain i’m drawn to a break between “someone” and “in.” But the intriguing nature of one line ku allows the reader to decide, and to allow ambiguity, and find different breaks, and different meanings, at different times. Or all at once: taken in, all at once, this ku has a meaning/reading that is all its own, quiet and intimate. Is that someone somehow “in the stars”? This implies death—that that person is now part of, or one with, the universe/cosmos. It’s abstract, but makes sense. Read a different way, the poet is presently “close to someone” (a lover, a friend, a neighbor) who is right there with them (in bed, on the porch, stargazing . . . ) and notices the color white, or the idea of the color white, in action. Why white? Is it, here, symbolic of purity, innocence, or a total absence of color?—all of which is entering the poet who is in need of these things, at least momentarily, in order to escape the “darkness.” Though the poem creates ambiguities and choices, it is, nevertheless, emotional and intimate, but not in an easy way. It guides, but makes one work for resolution, if that’s even desirable. It ends with “inward” and, thankfully, leaves us searching and quest/ioning there. ❦ a man in a crowd in a man John Stevenson This was a ku i immediately fell in love with, devoured, and have internalized. Which makes sense: the poetic aesthetics are internal, the words and imagery within it turning and playing with and off one another in dramatic and extravagant ways. It’s playful, yet profound; simple (wow, all one syllable words, with an “ow,” an echo of pain and hurt, right there in the center of it all), yet intricate. It is seasonless, and yet something tells me that for each reader a season will naturally well up, become a bubble and float inside the brain (for me, it’s “the fifth season”). It’s composition is so tight that not a word can be changed, rearranged, added or subtracted, yet it feels like it’s about to explode. Not just haiku or poetry at its best, but words at their best. ❦ whose ghost did you talk to all the way down Peggy Willis Lyles A descent into hades/hell? Or down to earth? Or a spiraling inward, into the soul? i revel in the mysteriousness of this ku; it challenges a single reading, perception, and beliefs, and invites my imagination. Who is the speaker? Who is being spoken to? What’s implied is that the person (the being being spoken to) did indeed speak to someone all the way down (i get the feeling that they are in a state of in-betweenness); that they’ve reached a conclusion/end, and reached it with the help and guidance of one of the ghosts. What did they talk about? And why? That familiar but eerie question bubbles up: if you could talk to a dead person, who would it be? i get the impression that whoever is being addressed was given a choice (adding yet another layer to the poem’s oddness and mysteriousness), and that the descent was a long one (“all the way down”). This ku feels biblical, mythological, with a nod to western literature (Dante’s Inferno), and with implications of an unresolved transformation. And while the ku evokes death and ghosts, it is full of life and spirit, energy and consciousness (an afterworld/afterlife/life after death). All in all, a dream-like state. The lack of punctuation (a question mark) creates further ambiguity and enigmaticness. It’s a ku that invites the reader to bring their entire life to its heart. ❦ under the nitrogen blue sky the white horse of my life Patrick Sweeney For me, this ku is about the fleetingness of life, motion, and also transformation. By invoking a gas (nitrogen), something ungraspable, yet definitive, is conjured. It’s a peculiar thing to use in a haiku poem—something scientifically named—yet it’s 78 % of the earth’s atmosphere, and so not that very peculiar at all; it feels modern though and part of our world and slang. The use of the word conjures exactness; it is precise and elemental. Again though, it has a vacuity to it, something odorless, escapable, always in motion, something that can not be held or tied down. What is “the white horse”? For me, it conjures speed, beauty, strength, freedom. It’s a strong (even mythically mighty) image that takes us from the infiniteness and ubiquitousness of the sky/air to something concrete. Yet, at the same time, it’s abstract and metaphorical. Is it not simply a cloud that looks like a horse? And does this cloud not remind the poet of their own life? How simple; how beautiful. There’s a purity and evanescence that i love about this ku. All in all, it leads me, ultimately, to disintegration. ❦ Twilight in the arrangement of stones Patrick Sweeney This ku lends itself immediately to a concrete reading: the very arrangement of its words, their careful placement and organization, and how they allude to the stones’ arrangement. The one line construction also evokes the bareness of the day’s light, of “twilight,” as well as the thinness of thought and energy at day’s end. What are these stones? If they are indeed in a a line, are they a wall, a boundary, a line not to be crossed, part of a game, or only the beginning of something’s construction (a house)? Alternately, i am drawn to them being the beginnings of a a ring of stones for a fireplace. Or perhaps, for no reason at all, other than fun, they’ve been lined up from smallest to largest by a child. Better yet, when i was a child, my brother and i would build a wall in the stream, a kind of cell, for the fish my father would catch. What i love about this one is how the ku escapes me time and time again; each time, i feel i am about to “get it,” and yet, whatever it is, remains just beyond my grasp. It lulls me and makes me work, makes me search (“how can twilight be in something? What does that arrangement look like?”). It lovingly—through the juxtaposition of the solid and the ephemeral, the cyclical and the stable—and simply involves, without pushing or pulling hard in one direction or another. It guides, and nudges, and then disappears, like a Cheshire cat. ❦ Monday bleeding down to money Peter Yovu I love the way this ku plays with words, time, images, and emotion without being overt or simplistic about it. Only two letters separate “Monday” and “money,” and by the time the poem ends they have, somehow (because of anxiety, violence (?), burnout), made a metamorphosis into “money,” something which is concrete, and yet, more often than not, quite abstract (especially in this Age of Swiping Plastic); what the hell is money, anyway? As so often, sadly, is the case, it does come “down to money.” There’s something sinister and blue about this ku for me, though the dominant color might be “in the red”. It conveys sadness, even heartbreak, over the way a system (on both a micro and macro level) works (chipping away/“the daily grind”). Not only is there a transformation in words, but also a transformation in personal well-being, feelings, consciousness, and attitude—the fluctuations of one’s mind and one’s role and function within a system. The one line structure adds to the overall effect: pressure, frailty, deadlines, a sense of being worn “down”/burnout, laying things on the line. On top of that, it’s playful with time. This ku, even more so than others, is not just cut out, but bloodily severed from time, from reality. Time resonates from both ends of it: the actions and energy spent before the poem occurs, creating a world of replenishing and stockpiling energy over a short weekend, and then, from its other end/cut (“money”), the draining of energy, stretching things (money) out, and struggling to Friday. Then starting all over again. All of this sense is juxtaposed against what image(s)? Each one is an open, surreal, abstraction: a day of the week bleeding, and money. And yet it all works, it makes sense, it feels right. ❦ Roadrunner X:1 Copyright © 2010. All rights reserved by the respective authors and artists.