Hi, Tim! Great to hear your voice here. It is is your fault i am here, and i want everyone to have a chance to blame you!

Of course, you know the Bight much, much better than i do--i have only ridden by it on my bicycle, you know. I think it is fair to say that we are all seeking expansion, though not necessarily in the number of words. YOur story makes me think of my dear friend Reef Perkins, legendary wrecker and comic poet sublime!

And speaking of key west, i would like to invite all of you to the Robert Frost Poetry Festival there next April 15-19, 2009. Here is the link, in case anyone is interested: http://www.robertfrostpoetryfestival.com/ (I hesitate to share this since there are a couple of stupid pictures of me from a couple of years ago on the site.) I will be giving a workshop there and there will be half a dozen other workshops by poets better than i, i can assure you. Here is one of the haiku i wrote there this past April,also 17 as you might notice:

sunset in the keys--
the puzzle of my life
with one piece to many

Lee

Martin, the longer I think about this the richer it becomes. The split oak is a figure for the man who has died; the widow is blaming herself for not knowing things--I think it must be for not knowing, in the husband's absence, how to take care of things--or is she also blaming herself for the deaths, the tree's and the man's? It seems to me the very opposite of end-stopped.

I only ask myself if there can be such a thing as too heavy a dependence on one word. "Widiot" is so full...

Martin, Certainly more open than the others, though this one also has its own weaknesses, i am afraid. It is really only one image, presented in the first two lines, followed by the third line telling you what the first image is. There is a sense of discovery here, which is good, but you have already done all of the discovering yourself. Not sure what to do to help you with this one, though you might consider replacing "yellow" with "color" or some other word that allows some change of perception in the poem. Please don't think i am telling you how to write, but maybe you can see a difference between yours, and say:

a dab of summer
in a meadow of snowmelt:
first dandelion

Of course, you may prefer your original to this, but i hope this give some idea of what i am trying to get across, which is that the poet must somehow "add value" to the scene by expanding the reader's possible response to it.

Lee

Thanks for the kind words and the interesting reading of the poem! Like you, I am a big fan of Billy Collins. Over the past 5 or 6 years, we have had the pleasure of publishing his haiku in Modern Haiku and publishing a fine press chapbook of his haiku, SHE WAS JUST SEVENTEEN. Though I like much of his work in haiku, the poem of his you quote is not, in my mind, a haiku but what i will refer to as a "17er", haiku in form but not in content. My favorite of his, which MH gave him a "best of issue" award for:

Mid-winter evening,
alone at the sushi bar—
just me and this eel. (MH 35.2, 2004)

By the way, next year is the 40th anniversary of Modern Haiku magazine!

Lee

Steve, Fabulous explanation of open endedness! Wow! And speaking of winter flies, here is one of my favorite haiku, by LeRoy Gorman:

last slow dance
winter flies
couple on the bar

which i find rich with resonances. Talk about open ended! Who is dancing here? And the flies at the bar . . . are they little winged creatures or, dare i say, "barflies" or both? Let the reader explore this three-line universe!

Lee

Sure--i'll be glad to!


Christmas morning feed
icicles in the horses tails
little bells jingling

sudden wind gust
prairie dust rises
to meet the rain

i think you have something here--the last two lines together are fabulous--but i think you have sort of "wasted" the first line. After all, we know there is a gust when we get to the second line. Somehow it seems you would do better to use the first line to give some inkling of the vast grandeur of the prairie, perhaps with the darkness or thunderheads of a summer storm?

satellite dish
a single raven is perched
foil in its beak

This haiku brings to mind one of the important tools japanese poets use to expand the scope of their poems: allude to other poems. We do this all the time in our other poetry, but poets here don't think of this so much in writing haiku. For me, this haiku brings to mind one of Basho's most famous haiku, in translation:

On a withered branch
a crow is perched--
autumn evening

If you know Basho's poem, it greatly addes to the interest of your poem and, by a reversal of moods, adds greatly to its interest. Here are a couple of other haiku that point to Basho's haiku. The first by Jeanne Emrich:

autumn evening--
the crow begins its caw
with a deep bow

and by New Zealander Ernest J. Berry,

second half
another crow settles
on our crossbar

Lee

Robert, i have signed on for a week, so i expect to be around till tuesday. Flight precluded http://www.ablemuse.com/erato/ubbhtml/smile.gif, I will go on to your haiku:

first light
on the cabin porch
mayflies

OK, but not a lot here

late night—
spring’s first fly
bounces off the wall

"late night" seems a bit like a toss off. perhaps you might consider something less general that will put us there?

summer evening
another quick chirp
from the microwave

nicely done! (though once again, you might consider something more concrete than the general "summer evening".)

yellow moon
along the icy prairie…
coming home

i think this one has great potential, though i don't think you are quite there yet. Not sure, for example, why you have "along". and the "coming home" makes me long, once again, for something more specific. you might want to play with this one and see how different ways of expressing this feel to you. in the end, you might find you like this version best, but i think it is worth the effort and don't think you will find it to be time wasted.

frost covers
an untilled field…
for sale

i can see corn from my window here and have to say that this is not what i would expect to see. at least in my part of the world at least, nothing is left untidy, especially something for sale.

evening fades—
a rusty tractor
covered by weeds

OK, but maybe the two images might be too close?

blustery day—
an eagle crouches
on the white boulder

And?

Orion rising
the sound of snow
beneath my feet

Why not give us the sound? And are you barefoot? http://www.ablemuse.com/erato/ubbhtml/smile.gif

a few flowers
among the weeds
a rusted trowel

like this one and the microwave ones best!

Hope this helps--and hope my comments don't sound too harsh!

Lee

Like your "willy willy" though you have to watch for words with multiple meanings! (e.g., I like my willy, too!)

Caps: well, the same here as anywhere else--whatever you do, do it intentionally and be sure you are able to answer, at least to yourself, why you did it!

Lee

Thanks Steve, you are a fabulous host! No Wheaties, but had some homemade bread with homemade jam! Yum, yum! And ready to go. (Well, actually, i have been going at it for two hours already. Maybe i will need the Wheaties before long!)

Lee

I will be glad to take a look--and you decide whether the comments are worthwhile.

Firefish
on firewood.

not sure i get this one. are the 'firefish' flames in the shape of fish or are they something else i am not familiar with?

sun
trade yellow silk
for moon and dark batwing nights.

interesting.

hawkweed seed in wind
moon in birdbaths
floating

a trifle awkward without an article in the first line.

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

seems just a bit pondeous, don't you think?

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

not sure i can put this all together

waxwings scallop
a part of Innisfree
with wingtips and will

i think this is the most successful so far. a am assuming you are referring to the garden. my only question here is why "a part"?

unfolding white chadors
on green roofs
mountain and treetops

has a certain spaciousness that is appealing.

clouds play crocket
cuba women
scuttling for cover.

not sure whay "crocket" is here. The only definition i can find is an architectural ornament, and that doesn't seem to fit.

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

can' figure out what a "gretter" is. Can you help?

sahara desert
shapes stretchïng over sand
shadows walking

just seems to be a picture

bats
and dreams
gone at suntime.

i think this brings us back to the first one, which i think is more ineresting. this one just seems to be a statement of fact.

I am afraid i haven't been of much help here. There is a certain dreaminess to your poems which i find appealing and a certain ambiguity. Both of these can be interesting in haiku, but please be careful not to leave the reader benind! Sorry not to have been of more help!

Lee