Hi Lee,

Thanks so much for today. You've been positively heroic!

And yes, do come back again tomorrow . . . just don't forget to eat your Wheaties!

On behalf of everyone here, thanks, thanks, thanks!

Steve C.

*

(Edited back to add Google NOINDEX code for the new page.)

[This message has been edited by Stephen Collington (edited October 17, 2008).]

Maryann-- if I may steal your image for a kids version --

Heed iced over pass
below air frozen fog deep
that troll still nimble

now that has set me off-- again lol thanks

(Edited back to add Google NOINDEX code for the new page.)

damnit stephen you are speaking in tongues again http://www.ablemuse.com/erato/ubbhtml/biggrin.gif

Steve C. is the hostest with the mostest! I'd been wondering if every page had "the code." This class is a great experience. I really appreciate all your caring attention, not to mention the wealth of links.

I still like your first version best, Maryann. It captures shivering fear. I'd pare it down like this -

bridge ice-slick
canyon howling below
how to go on?

Hi, Lee! And thanks again.
I guess I need to return to the drawing board on this one. It's behind the house because behind the house is usually less visible - of course, it depends on where you are standing. The bears are growing fat because they break the tree branches in the process of getting the fruit. I've seen some trees that are nearly ruined because of the bears.
So I was trying to say that here are these bears who are already fat, destroying the apple trees in order to get fatter still, and doing it mostly out of sight. Too much for a haiku, maybe?

Thanks also for the punctuation clarification. http://www.ablemuse.com/erato/ubbhtml/smile.gif

Really appreciate this, Lee. I would be delighted if you'd consider some of my small poemlets. Haiku not being my forte, I'll leave it for you to decide if one of these can be called haiku.

Firefish
on firewood.

*

sun
trade yellow silk
for moon and dark batwing nights.

*

hawkweed seed in wind
moon in birdbaths
floating

*

bring a raincoat
clouds bring the weight
of sky in their bellies

*

seventeen fireflies
make a puddle two toes
in front of my shoes.

*

waxwings scallop
a part of Innisfree
with wingtips and will

*

unfolding white chadors
on green roofs
mountain and treetops

*

clouds play crocket
cuba women
scuttling for cover.

*

seven cows
death's greeters*
searching for an exit in the sky

*

sahara desert
shapes stretchïng over sand
shadows walking

*

bats
and dreams
gone at suntime.

*fixed from "gretters"



[This message has been edited by Chiago Mapocho (edited October 18, 2008).]

Bloody oath, Henie! Almost got whacked by a falling gum branch the other day. The rangers have since taken the whole thing down with a chainsaw before the wind gets another chance.

Mary - your

Quote:

black wing white moon first frost

etched on my retina at first sight.

Walking through the cemetery today, I found these two.

native grass
the widow bends
to drought and grave

ghost gum roots
cracking the headstone
r -- i -- p

Cally


[This message has been edited by Cally Conan-Davies (edited October 18, 2008).]

Is this too end-stopped? Too clear or too unclear?

The lightning-split oak
is leafless this summer; she calls
herself widiot.

David, Thanks for the kind words. I haven't thought about these poems for a long time--the newest one of them was written over 20 years ago--so i don't even think them as mine anymore. The first one was once in a grammar school literature textbook, so I think of it as one of my childhood poems.

Yes, The Haiku Handbook is an essential reference. And for me, it was a lifeline. I "discovered" haiku through a book of R.H. Blyth's translations when i was in high school. I wrote bad haiku on and off for almost 20 years, not realizing there was anyone else interested in it. And then one day i opened up a Newsweek, and there was a review of Bill's book by Cor van den Heuvel. (Many of you will recognize him as the editor of three editions of The Haiku Anthology, another haiku classic.) This opened up a new world to me--the living world of haiku. I will always be grateful to Bill and Cor.

Early in my new "haiku career" Bill was very kind to me and generous with his time. When he and his wife Penny, also a very fine poet but he way, moved to New Mexico in 1991, our house was one of the places they stayed on their journey, of which they wrote a travel journal ala Basho's Oku. And again, when the moved back to New Jersey several years ago, we had the pleasure of opening the doors of what Bill referred to as "The Haiku Hotel".

I am not sure i can sum up Bill's contribution in a few words. First, there is The Haiku Handbook. Then there is his insistence that people in the West understand that haiku is a living tradition. He insisted we pay attention to contemporary Japanese haiku, furthering this contact through his own translations of contemporary Japanese poets. His work resulted in the flowering of relationships between Japanese and gaijin haiku poets and an explosion of cross fertilization. He worked tirelessly to evangelize an understanding of the vitality of the seasonal image in haiku. On the other hand, he also insisted we not get stuck in a quasi-religious, "zen haiku," championing diversity of approach to the genre. He also very early on understood the potential of the intenet to provide poets and readers with a deep understanding of haiku. (If you look back at the initial list of resources Stephen shared, you will see several of Bill's resources.) My understanding of haiku, as well as that of many others, would be considerably poorer without Bill's tireless work. I considered him a friend and a mentor and will miss him greatly.

I should still be here when you come back, so I will look forward to hearing your voice again.

Lee

P.S. Off to breakfast and feeding the animals! See you all in a little while!

Thanks, Lee and others, for sending me back to my ice-slick bridge. Perhaps I will figure out "how to go on"--

I notice something about this one from Robert P:

summer evening
another quick chirp
from the microwave

It makes me stop and ponder what's wrong, or what's right; is it for a good or a bad reason that the N. is inside, using a microwave, on a summer evening? I think that's what open-ended means.