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The 23 Best Haiku of 2023

Winner and Runners-up of the Society of Classical Poets 2023 Haiku Competition

Judged by J. Thomas Rimer and Margaret Coats (see their remarks below)

See all entrants here.

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COMPETITION WINNER

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Swallow, an arrow
bursts across the burnished blue
I cannot catch time
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—Alena Casey
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RUNNERS-UP IN SEASONAL ORDER

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Splinters of sunshine
piercing the morning silence .  .  .
icicles crumble
—Keith A. Simmonds
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oh I cannot touch
that branch of cherry blossoms
that is touching me
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—Lucia Haase
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on Easter Sunday
a great tit out and about
in his smart black cap
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—Andrew Shimield
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mid-monsoon showers
the sound of daily footsteps
turns into splashes
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—Hla Yin Mon
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as I walk barefoot
my footsteps are filling up
with rain, then sunshine
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—Stefanie Bucifal
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twilight gardening
a grey and white mosquito
flits ever closer
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—Barbara Strang.
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Waked to August rain
Soothing in its constancy
With it my heart beats
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—Gigi Ryan
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In the oar’s eddy
swirling on a maple leaf
one ant near the edge
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—Richard Matta
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Peaches picked, not ripe
Sit on the sill and sweeten
Aging, we summer
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—Maura H. Harrison
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The old man sits there
Watching the magnolias—
Lost in yesterday
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—Ruddy Gordon
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Patient desert winds
grain-by-grain shift a sand dune.
Thus mountains are moved.
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—Paul A. Freeman
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cracking desert crust
skies reclaiming silent clouds
summer humbling earth
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—Portly Bard
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Solstice
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Summer in decline
In my bones I can feel it
Earth’s tilt and turning
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—Sharon Mueller
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Out of parched corn-rows
fly fat, black ears—the wind reaps
a harvest of crows
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—Carey Jobe
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a cold lonesome night
through the half-open window
climbs the harvest moon
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—Neena Singh
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swans, having cast off
their indigo hakama
share grey skymantle
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hakama:  traditional Japanese garment flowing from waist to ankle
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—Sheila Barksdale
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abandoned farmhouse
collapsing into itself
if not for the vines
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—Jacquie Pearce
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moon in a puddle
the wet and dark reverse side
of a fallen leaf
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—Alex Malley
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leafless cherry trees—
the same world as yesterday
but with no more love
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—Marcellin Dallaire-Beaumont
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snowy train station
my window stopping slowly
to frame the silence
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—Eduard Tara
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Huddled in holly
cold sparrows without a neck.
Winter seclusion.
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—Ian Richardson
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the crowded ballroom
and snowflakes swirl quietly
outside the window
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—Urszula Marciniak
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The winning haiku by Alena Casey presents a swallow as an image of dazzling energy, in tension with the speaker’s unfulfilled desire to “catch time.”  The dynamism of image and desire creates a vibrant poem, comparable to one by Japanese master Matsuo Bashō, given below in Roman letters, with translation by David Barnhill.
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hototogisu
kieyuku kata ya
shima hitotsu
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cuckoo
off where it disappears
a single island
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In both English and Japanese poems, one sees a bird on its way to an indistinct vanishing point.  Thrilling motion in the natural order is followed by contemplation.  Casey longs for the ability to catch time, which in one sense means the power to reproduce or memorialize the moment as experienced.  More broadly, she expresses a yearning to control time and make the pleasant present permanent.  This is not humanly possible, but the poem enables her to foreground the thought vividly.  Bashō considers space rather than time, the bird becoming a mere spot on the horizon.  An island may or may not be visible.  Either way, it represents the unretainable flight of the cuckoo seen by the Japanese poet.  “Hototogisu” is one of those 5-syllable words representing a formidable challenge to every poet writing in Japanese.  How can one take the iconic bird name and make a poem that says anything original with only 12 additional syllables?  It is a classic exercise in traditional style.  Alena Casey seems to respond in English with a new avian name of 5 syllables, “Swallow, an arrow”—and a poem of original vigor.
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Barbara Strang offers an amusing contrast to Casey and Bashō.  She does not wish nature in the shape of a mosquito to linger nearby, and thus she records its flitting approaches as an ominous experience.
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Andrew Shimield spots a bird acting in accord with human ways.  His great tit, strutting about on Easter Sunday wearing the “smart black cap” characteristic of his species, fits right in with ladies and their bonnets on Easter parade.
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Carey Jobe’s parched corn-rows don’t at first suggest birds.  In a gradual revelation, the wind kicks up and reaps what looks like flying black ears of corn, but is in fact “a harvest of crows” who have consumed the remains of the crop.
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In another description of birds flying away, Sheila Barksdale portrays swans as rising from water by casting off “indigo hakama.”  Hakama in different shades of blue are formal dress for persons engaging in different schools of martial arts; this is an elaborate way of suggesting the beauty and artistry of the birds as they swim.  Flying together, their lower bodies now uncovered, they share the grey mantle of the sky.
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Haiku can function like riddles or proverbs—after the poet sets up a question with understated artistry.  Notice how Keith A. Simmonds explains that soundless sunshine pierces silence, and how Paul A. Freeman observes winds moving mountains.  Eduard Tara asks the reader how and why a window stops slowly, but envisions the answer with his opening line setting the scene in a train station.
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Neena Singh sets her scene in a cold lonesome night.  The lack of warm companionship suggests a welcome intruder when the harvest moon “climbs” through her window.  The word choice is much more exciting than “shines.”
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To Urszula Marciniak, a window is the border between worlds.  She crams her crowded noisy one into the first line of 5 syllables, and most unusually lets the simple, unnecessary “and” act as “cutting word” to emphasize the ballroom’s separation from nature.  The two worlds become comparable only because of her word “swirl.”
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Lucia Haase depicts connection and conflict between poet and nature.  The word “that” is repeated, and the conspicuous second “that,” considered as the subject of a new sentence, introduces double meaning.  She is touched by the beauty of the cherry blossoms, but sadly as well by her situation of being unable to touch them physically.  The two words “touch” and “touching” also interact with subtle nuance.
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Gigi Ryan, on the other hand, writes a poem of intimate harmony between self and nature.  The opening word “Waked” reveals the speaker coming to consciousness for the day, immediately soothed by the constancy of August rain.  Going on to speak of her heartbeat intensifies the impression of complete comfort due to real similarity.
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In her haiku entitled “Solstice,” Sharon Mueller feels attuned to imperceptible seasonal changes.  The summer solstice happens in June, long before summer weather is over.  Subsequent decline in hours of daylight is the result of change in “Earth’s tilt and turning,” normally unnoticed by Earth’s inhabitants, but felt in the bones of this speaker.  She thus claims unique closeness to the earth’s motions, perhaps due to years of experience with it.
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Ruddy Gordon, though, sees an old man lost in the past.  This too comes from intent observation of nature while he is seated “watching the magnolias.”  Gordon’s poem takes a third-person view of nature and the response of an observed human being.  The third person omniscience of Portly Bard is much less common.  His view from above sees not only the dried desert, but also skies withdrawing clouds that are silent in their refusal to speak rain.  Summer seems a scorching scourge intent on humbling earth.  “K” and “s” and “m” sounds contribute to the fierce effect.  Maura H. Harrison changes “p” sounds to “s” sounds to indicate change as she contemplates peaches ripening, then applies the observation to human aging.  She transforms “summer” into a state-of-being verb.
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Perspective in Richard Matta’s haiku continually diminishes from an oar’s eddy in water to a maple leaf moving within it to one ant on an edge of the leaf—swirling in peril of his life, as emphasized by his off-center position.  Alex Malley also uses shrinking perspective, established in his first line as the moon seen in a puddle, which on closer observation turns out to be a leaf, and indeed the “wet and dark reverse side” of that leaf in contrast to puddle water.  These words call to mind the mysterious dark side of the moon.  Jacquie Pearce, too, takes a closer look at the focal point of her poem, an abandoned farmhouse, to see that its identity as such seems to be collapsing, preserved only by the vines growing upward and outward in and around the decaying remains of the house.
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Marcellin Dallaire-Beaumont sees spring’s lovely cherry trees leafless.  This means a great portion of the year is gone, for once blossoms fall, leaves flourish for a very long time. The poet invites consideration about when and how and why love seems to vanish from the world.   Ian Richardson delves into seclusion, with the image of sparrows retracting their heads to preserve body heat, such that they seem to lack “a neck.”  He speaks of a flock, but there is not a single neck among them. His winter poem ponders self-protective behavior as it affects individuals and groups.
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Hla Yin Mon observes a change in everyday sound produced by the seasonal monsoon.  This is a minimal way of noticing its major effect on life during the showers, and afterward on growing things.  Stefanie Bucifal shows what may look like a sequential effect.  When she walks barefoot, imprints made by her feet fill with rain, then sunshine.  This could take hours, but if one imagines unusual weather with rain while the sun is shining, the sun’s brightness reflects even as rainwater collects.
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The judges are honored to have had the opportunity of reading so many fine haiku written throughout the English-speaking world during the past year.  We love the long and continuing tradition of this lyric form in Japan.  All you poets who have entered this competition contribute to its spread throughout the world, in a way that can be compared to the Italian sonnet sweeping Europe in the past.
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Congratulations to Alena Casey for her winning haiku, and to every runner-up, especially Stefanie Bucifal, Urszula Marciniak, and Andrew Shimield who appear for the second year in a row among the runners-up.
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RECOMMENDED BOOKS OF TRADITIONAL FORM HAIKU IN ENGLISH

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Mary Harwell Sayler, Haiku Happening (published in 2023 by an SCP member)
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Edith Shiffert, Kyoto Dwelling
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PETER PAUPER PRESS TRANSLATIONS OF JAPANESE CLASSICS

Japanese Haiku (available FREE online from the Haiku Foundation)
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NOTE TO READERS: If you enjoyed this poem or other content, please consider making a donation to the Society of Classical Poets.

The Society of Classical Poets does not endorse any views expressed in individual poems or commentary.


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53 Responses

  1. James A. Tweedie

    Wow! These are awesome, beautiful and visually stimulating! Congratulations to Alena for her winning haiku and to all the others who were among the chosen. And, of course, special thanks to Margaret and co-judge J. Thomas for their gift of time, knowledge and wisdom in this celebration of haiku.

    Reply
  2. Steve Todd

    Congratulations to Alena Casey, and to all the fine runners-up. Some really great pieces in there, and it was fun taking part. Roll on next year!

    Reply
  3. Paul A. Freeman

    Hats off to Alena, all the runners-up, to Margaret (who took on this huge task, and in her ever-precise fashion even put the runners-up into seasonal order), and to everyone who took the time and effort to compete.

    I’ve had fun.

    Reply
  5. James Sale

    I am a great non-admirer and non-champion of haiku since I think it works against the grain of the English language, which is essentially metrical and iambic. That said, well done the judges on this selection, and especially the winning poet/poem: Alena Casey’s 3 lines are stunningly good – that last line is a wonderful, decisive and unexpected surprise. If only all haiku were this good, I might change my mind!

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    • Patricia Allred

      Hello James.
      I most welcomed your open expressions about your feelings on Haiku.
      And simultaneously do congratulate the winner plus all roomer-ups as well.!

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      • James Sale

        Thanks Patricia – and yes, all achievement must be celebrated. All round, this is a great set of results.

  6. Monika Cooper

    Congratulations to Alena! And to all the runners-up.

    It’s a joy to take a deeper look at these chosen poems.

    My five year old found the last “patch,” as she calls the shape haiku makes on the screen, the one that begins with “the crowded ballroom,” so beautiful that it made her sad, especially the last two lines.

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  9. jd

    Yes, congratulations to all, especially Alena. I found all 25 beautiful and unusual and am appreciative of the hard work of the judges. I also look forward to concentrating on the exposition of each one. Thank you!

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  10. Mia

    Congratulations Alena and well done everyone. All the haiku’s are beautiful. Thank you to the judges and to SCP for such a wonderful contest.

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  11. Nancy Brady

    Congrats to Alena and to all the runners-up. Well done to all including the commentaries on each haiku.

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  12. Maura H. Harrison

    To the judges,
    I’m grateful to have my haiku mentioned as a runner up.
    Thank you for your time. It is greatly appreciated.

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  13. Alena Casey

    What an incredible honor! Thank you so much to Margaret and J. Thomas for reading all the submissions and curating this amazing selection. Thank you also for the education you provided about haiku. Until last year when I first looked at your page about it, I had only ever seen haiku as a form presented as “5/7/5,” and learning more about the intricacies and complexities of the form was fascinating.

    There are so many beautiful haiku on this page, I know I will come back again and again. It’s a great honor and joy to be among these poems. Congratulations to all the runners-up, and bravo to everyone who wrote, submitted, and learned a little more about haiku.

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  14. J. Thomas Rimer

    It was a privilege and a great pleasure to be a judge for this year’s haiku contest. As a professor of Japanese literature for so many years, it is a happy surprise for me both to see how haiku have become so well rooted in the world of English-language poetry, and in particular to see the high level of accomplishment so many of these poems achieve. I only wish that I were still teaching, because I know how much my students would have admired and appreciated them. And to all you contestants, keep up your fine work and good luck next year!

    So thank you, and congratulations to all.

    Tom Rimer

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  15. Portly Bard

    judging is one thing
    speaking so well to those judged
    is quite another

    Margaret, the thoughts you and Dr. Rimer have presented on each of the twenty three finalists is a gift precious beyond measure. Together, you have transformed a contest into an extremely useful resource, complete with bibliography, notably in the spirit of serving the SCP mission. Dr. Rimer obviously senses that, and I believe you do too.

    You have made very clear what English haiku are and are not.

    To Mr. Sale’s point, I agree with him that applying the term “poetry” to English haiku implies attribution understandably untenable to those, like he and I, who equate poetry solely to prosody.

    I agree with Mr. Sale that haiku, while prescriptive, are not typically prosodic in English — and they are certainly not so by requirement as you have carefully explained..

    That said, I do believe, however, that while not required, haiku can certainly be rhymed, can be rhythmic, and can be logically metrical though not lines of successive identical feet.

    Mr. Sale would have done better, I think, to describe English as accentual rather than somewhat misleadingly as metrical (in a very broad sense of that term).

    His assertion of iambic predominance in English might very well be valid (alernating degrees of stress is inarguable), but his implicit suggestion that all literary formalism must be rooted in iambic precision is not valid to my mind. Each of the four meters has a place in that formalism. And so does patterned stress count. And so does haiku as a prescriptive, rule-based literary discipline whose nature sufficiently, I think, explains SCP adoption and your personal championing.

    Thus, while I would agree with Mr. Sale that haiku, far more often than not, read like micro free verse, I woud suggest that sticking rigidly to haiku form and rules separates the discipline markedly from modernism. When compliant and done well, English haiku is an art that deserves the celebration you joyously and credibly give it, even if only — to some — as non-prosodic formalism.

    I am ceetainly among those who have deeply apprecited your annual effort to promote it.

    Portly Bard

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    • James Sale

      Thanks Portly Bard – but to be clear, I don’t think I am saying that we need to write exclusively in iambic, since clearly we don’t: there’s trochees, anapaests and a host of other prosodic patterns, which are – to use your word – accentual. The thing about iambic, though, which you freely concede, is that it is everywhere in our language because of its structure. I think it was Professor FW Bateson many years ago who commented that some 90% of great English poetry was written in the iambic form. That calculation seems about right to me: Byron’s Assyrian poem isn’t iambic, neither is Tennyson’s Lady of S, and they’re great poems, but when you consider the bulk of Spenser, Shakespeare, Milton, Dryden, Keats et al you realise where one’s attention needs to be! Thanks again.

      Reply
      • Portly Bard

        I am very grateful that you got past my regrettable typos and took time to reply. You and I largely agree on the prosodic side. No one can dispute the historic abundance of iambic prosodic intent and of the resulting work it put on the shelf. But neither can anyone dispute, as you acknowledge, the greatness achieved in other meters and in accentual rhythm patterns.

        My primary concern about your emphatic reference to iambic exclusively was your use of it to support disliking non-prosodic English haiku, which do not require it. Your slight of prosodic options other than iambic was implicitly suggested to my ear, not stated. I didn’t think it was intentionally as strong as it sounded, and I think your clarification posted here serves SCP well.

        Again, notwithstanding the current mission language, I think the SCP embrace of English haiku under the banner of its formalism revival aim is valid. But defending the Engish haiku genre as English prosody, as some are inclined to do, is not. It is very challenging, rule based English emulation of Japanese poetry, but that does not make it traditional English poetry. And I think Margaret describes the works as poems only in that emulative sense.

        The right to disfavor English haiku personally has no evidentiary requirement, so I had no problem with your aversion per se, and I found your candor refreshing. I just think the way Margaret insists on authentic emulation keeps it within reasonable bounds for SCP and makes it a great exercise for traditional poets.

        As for where the English tradition should should place its attention, I have a somewhat different view. Opportunity will always abound in iambic intent, but regenerating the traditional passion you cite is going to require a broader metric horizon.

        But this thread needs to focus on English haiku.

    • Margaret Coats

      Portly Bard, please forgive my delay of several days in expressing gratitude for your generous and extended comments. I feel the honor of such attention and praise for my critical efforts. I am glad you and James Sale were able to bring an important discussion to this thread, one that considers the issues rather than dribbles haiku-resistant carping at others who practice or enjoy the form. As you say, those who dislike English haiku have every right to their taste. It is far too late, however, to wish away the vast numbers of haiku written nearly everywhere English is spoken. And we must acknowledge that many of these creative efforts are channeled into informal and less disciplined modes that produce minimalist free verse. These writings occupy many haiku publications, some of which explicitly reject writers following a more traditional adaptation of classic Japanese conventions. I am happy SCP provides a place for this type of formal poetry, and allows this competition to welcome the world to a small showcase of it. Thank you very much for your recognition of what is done here.

      Reply
  16. Susan Jarvis Bryant

    Huge CONGRATULATIONS to Alena Casey (what a beautiful haiku) and to all the runners up. It’s wonderful to have the commentaries on each poem – the attention to detail by the judges is thoroughly appreciated.
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  17. Paul Martin Freeman

    Congratulations to Alena Casey on her verse whose fine poetic qualities have been recognised by the judges. I wish only to add a note of caution in the comparison with Matsuo Bashō.

    Bashō grew up in a world suffused with Zen and is celebrated for poems that explore the Zen experience. Attired in the robes of a Zen priest, he travelled around Japan in spiritual and poetic pilgrimages (angya), deepening that experience.

    The essence of Zen is the buddhist teaching of “emptiness” (śūnyatā). The Buddha saw that what we call the self is “empty”, without the substantive reality we credit it with. Believing ourselves to be self-existent beings, we live in a dualistic world of separateness and opposition. This is “suffering” (dukkha).

    Bashō’s poem inhabits the empty, non-dual, non-separate and non-oppositional world of Zen. In this world of “no-self”, there is no Bashō anywhere. Not a speck. All there is is the lonely hototogisu. Bashō has become the hototogisu, disappearing with it as do we in that oneness (hitotsu).

    In contrast to this, after her stunning opening lines, Alena Casey introduces the self as her focus in its yearning to catch time, a yearning always bound to be unfulfilled because of the dualistic way it is framed.

    Alena, what advice do you think Bashō might give you about catching time?

    Reply
  18. Margaret Coats

    Thank you, Paul Martin, for your Buddhist interpretation of Basho’s poem. Any reader may interpret any poem however he likes, with a worthy interpretation always based on the words of a poetic work. Poets are sometimes surprised to learn they have said more than they intended. There can be too much caution in tying the reader to the poet’s philosophy, biography, and milieu. Dr. Rimer probably knows more in this case than you or I, but he found Alena Casey’s haiku comparable to this one by Basho because of its remarkably similar artistic energy. I agree. You may if you like find either no energy and no Basho, or energy in the contrast of the hototogisu with emptiness and non-duality. These are generic Buddhist ideas not particular to Zen. I prefer to see Basho’s greatness in haiku as related to the essential Zen practice of seated meditation. It made him an excellent observer capable of conveying his insights in very specific words. We do need to take care with words. “Hitotsu” is a Japanese counting word applied to some “ones” but not others. In the haiku it specifies the number of “island” (“shima”). Please excuse me, therefore, for preferring David Barnhill’s “a single” island to your “oneness” into which poet, bird, island, and we readers disappear. Your interpretation is interesting, not wrong as it would be if you thought “one” meant “won,” but I find it farther from words of the poem than mine.

    Reply
    • Paul Martin Freeman

      Well, Margaret, that’s quite a tirade against what you, a professed Christian, describe as a “Buddhist interpretation” of a poem written by a Buddhist. This, while in itself odd, begs the question: “Can there be a legitimate Christian interpretation of a poem by a Buddhist?” And your answer––made, oddly again, in the course of giving me, the “Buddhist” here, your Christian view of Buddhism––is oddness itself. For it comes down to this: “Yes, but only by excluding what is Buddhist about it.” Because that’s what you’re doing when denying the Zen in the poem and confining it in Basho’s life to his practice of seated meditation, which, in your (Christian) view, merely had the effect of making him into “an excellent observer capable of conveying his insights in very specific words”.

      But this denial or blindness to the Zen nature of the poem has been the problem from the start, and your interpretation of Basho’s poem would turn him into another non-Zen nature poet––extraordinary given his incomparable status among Buddhists and followers of Zen everywhere. But just try googling “Basho oneness”, and you’ll see the weight of western scholarship is behind my “Buddhist interpretation” as well.

      On the point about “hitotsu”. Whatever the requirement of the translator to reproduce the original in an equivalent line of five syllables, as you would be the first to point out, in poetry we allow words to have different layers of meaning. So, while yes, “shima hitotsu” can mean “a single island”, we cannot get away from that word “hitotsu”, the single (no pun intended) most important word in the training of a Japanese Zen Buddhist monk, the aim of which is sometimes described as oneness with the universe (tenchi to hitotsu).

      On the “energy” of the two poems, no, I don’t see any similarity. Basho’s poem breathes oneness and stillness; Alena’s, dualism and tension. (On this quality in Basho’s work, see, for example, A Zen Wave, by Robert Aitken, the first American Zen Master.)

      I think the difficulty stems from Professor Rimer’s use of the word “contemplation” in relation to the two poems. (“Thrilling motion in the natural order is followed by contemplation.”) But, while Alena reflects on her alienated state (sorry for the pun, Alena!)––thinking about it––Basho is absorbed in the disappearing hototogisu and island. These are different states of consciousness with the difference masked by this word which can refer to both.

      My overall point here is that we don’t do either of these two fine poets any kindness by trying to relate them. Only the form links them. Otherwise they are very different kinds of poets and belong to different worlds. One is characteristically Japanese; the other, western.

      At the same time, it seems to me that in trying to force Alena’s poem to relate to Basho’s, we’ve lost sight of important elements in her haiku making it so special and beautiful. Because these have never been mentioned. I’m referring, of course, to two features you won’t find in Basho: the meter and alliteration.

      But my deepest concern is best explained by this. If there were a poetry competition in Japan to produce the finest sonnet, how would we feel if the winning entry were compared to Sonnet 18? I think that might set the cat among the pigeons at the SCP, and people here would be quick to point out differences in poetic sensibility, etc between the two poems.

      In my view, Kipling, who knew a lot about these things, was right: “East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall meet.” Happily, I notice some acknowledgement of this in what Professor Rimer writes about himself:

      “I assure you that I remain as fascinated, and surprised, by Japan now as I was fifty years ago.”

      We gaijin never get to the end of learning about Japan. Remember those wonderful columns by Don Maloney? They’re a salutary lesson for us all!

      Reply
      • Margaret Coats

        Paul Martin, the issue for me is not religious. For you, it is religious, and that’s the difference we have here about reading poetry. I say there is not one correct interpretation to any poem. There can be as many valid interpretations as there are conscientious readers who pay attention to the work of art. I say that any reader can interpret a poem as he likes, as long as he bases his interpretation on the art of the poem, namely, on its words. I say that the author himself, having given the poem to a reader, becomes another reader. The reader who is not the author can make a valid interpretation that diverges from one given by the author–but for nearly every poem, the author has left only the poem and no interpretation. Literary critics offer numerous variant interpretations. I have spoken and written and thought many thousands of interpretations.

        You have a problem because in this results announcement I interpreted a poem by Basho in a way you consider incorrect. You offer a different interpretation that I accept as valid while preferring my own. That’s not a tirade against you or anything you said.

        Your second problem is that Tom Rimer compared a poem by Basho to one by Alena Casey, and you find the comparison invalid on religious grounds. You think the poems are alike in form and nothing else, and thus ought not to be compared. Your judgment is religious, Rimer’s is aesthetic.

        I suggest that the images as well as the form in both poems are comparable.

        In my very brief outline of the two poems, I paid attention to similarities and differences. But that is not enough for you, apparently because you adopt a thoroughgoing religious interpretation of the Basho poem, presumed to be that of the poet. Again, thank you for giving it, and for explaining how you think Alena Casey’s poem is other and not comparable.

        As to your question of whether there can be a legitimate Christian interpretation of a poem by a Buddhist, the answer is yes. It needs to be based on the words of the poem.

        I, however, find the question odd because I do not read poems looking for a Christian interpretation, unless the words of the poem invite me to do so. In my outline above, I wrote two sentences about image and process in the two poems. Your problem there is probably the word “thrilling” because you do not believe, from religious considerations, that Basho could have considered the flight of a bird thrilling. Then I wrote three more sentences on the Basho poem alone. Your problem with these latter sentences is NOT that I made a Christian interpretation, but that I confined myself to word and image, and did not introduce a Buddhist interpretation.

        In your view, Basho poems must have a Buddhist interpretation, even one that can be particularly identified as Zen. I am open to such interpretation, but that’s not my procedure for reading and enjoying this great poet.

      • Joshua C. Frank

        Paul, if I may use one of my own poems as an analogy, my poem “Ballad of the Video-Game Hero” (here: https://classicalpoets.org/2022/10/05/the-tech-addicts-lament-and-other-poetry-by-joshua-c-frank/ ), published a year ago today, about a video-game hero (I pictured Super Mario) rejected by the people he spent his life saving because they were bribed by the villain, was based on the fact that the followers of Jesus Christ in the Western world have been turning away from Him after centuries of devotion. Yet one of the commenters said:

        “I appreciate the plight of the hero, who has been stuck in a repetitive loop for years in a kind of Sisyphean quest, who ends up betrayed, aged, and empty-handed. The parallel with the players of the game (in this world) is easy to draw, and it is clear that they may suffer the same fate if they don’t break out of their addiction…”

        I thought that was a brilliant interpretation, and absolutely true (in fact, my poem “No Extra Lives” is based on that concept), but that’s not what I had in mind when I wrote it. Yet I still consider it to be a good and proper interpretation. I wrote the poem with its extended metaphor, and my readers always bring their own experience to it and gain their own meanings from it. That interpretation naturally followed from the story, even though I hadn’t thought of it myself as I wrote it. If someone, Christian or not, wrote a similar poem and meant it to be about the lifelong gamer, I think a comparison between my poem and his would be valid. As a Christian, I would still read his poem and think, “Sounds kind of like Jesus being rejected by the West.”

        Similarly, I think it’s valid to compare and contrast Alena’s poem with Basho’s.

      • Alena Casey

        Paul, thank you for your thoughtful comment. I do find your interpretation accurate, insofar as Master Basho’s poem concludes with a sense of calm, mine with a sense of longing. The judges, on the other hand, identified similarities between the two poems such as the imagery and the form. These two interpretations are not mutually exclusive. I agree with Margaret that there may be many interpretations to a poem which, so long as they are based in the words of the poem, are valid. I’m wondering if you are mainly taking issue with the comparison (which you believe neglects the essential energy of the two poems), or if you find the dualistic nature of my poem inappropriate to the haiku form?

        For my part, I am so new a student of haiku that winning this competition was a shock to me. I do not speak a word of Japanese, nor am I much familiar with Buddhism or Zen. However, I approached this beautiful Japanese form with eagerness and reverence and I am grateful for the opportunity to study and work with it. I would be just as happy to see Japanese poets making the sonnet their own.

      • Paul Martin Freeman

        Hello Margaret, I am replying to your post below in a general reply to all in this thread.

      • Paul Martin Freeman

        That goes for Joshua and Alena, too. Sorry for the confusion.

  19. Evan Mantyk

    To Paul and Margaret, I personally think the comparison makes perfect sense. Both feature flying birds and necessarily suggest a vibrance. Actually, I teach mostly Chinese and Asian students and am a student of Chinese language and culture myself, and often make comparisons across the two cultures for my students’ sake. There are very interesting differences between East and West and there are very interesting similarities too.

    I could also be described as Buddhist, as I practice a spiritual discipline, Falun Dafa (aka Falun Gong) that is of the Buddhist tradition. The difference that Paul points out is there I think, but so are the obvious similarities. In Zen there is this idea of emptiness, but the empty blue sky suggests an emptiness as well. Even if the Zen poet says there is nothing there, he or she still wrote it so you can’t really escape that it is not totally empty. Zen takes this to a bit of an extreme in my opinion.

    Reply
  20. James Sale

    There are two things that I particularly dislike about PMF’s comments. One, they presume to start telling other poets – in this case, the winning poet – how to write a poem, which I regard as a massive act of presumption. Second, it also pontificates that only a carpenter can tell whether a wooden table is well-made or not – for isn’t that the drift of …Christians can’t understand Buddhist poems? Where does this lead? Only women can understand women’s poetry… only gays can understand gay poetry… in fact, only children can understand children’s poetry? These comments seem to me self-serving and wrong.

    Reply
  21. Joseph S. Salemi

    James Sale has touched on a key point. There is a dangerous and sick modern tendency to tribalize everything, and insist that only certified members of a religion, a race, a culture, a party, a sex, a nation, an ethnicity (or even some other totally off-the-wall individualist self-definition) have the right to analyze and discuss the artifacts produced by that group. Anything else is “appropriation,” or some other stupid dogwhistle word.

    This tendency is a denial of a general human intelligence and sympathy. Anyone with a brain can analyze and comment on whatever he chooses, without having to show a passport that gives him permission.

    Reply
    • Paul Martin Freeman

      To Margaret and others.

      This entire conversation is based on misconceptions. I didn’t write that I was offering a “Buddhist interpretation” of Basho’s poem. It was Margaret who wrote that on the basis of her mistaken view that Zen is a religion. She then went to claim that other, non-Buddhist “interpretations” are also equally “valid”. This false and misleading dichotomy (Buddhist vs non-Buddhist) is the root of the problem here.

      What in fact I wrote was that this is a Zen poem. That’s not any kind of “interpretation”–– Buddhist or otherwise. It’s a statement of fact which doesn’t have to do with anything other than the poem itself. It has nothing to do with any religious convictions I may or may not have. It’s a statement that could be made by a Scottish Calvinist, a Chinese Marxist, or a fully kitted-out Apache war chief! It’s just self-evidently true. And I wrote, further, that if we don’t see it as a Zen poem or if we are blind to the Zen in it, we don’t get beyond the surface to understand what it’s really all about. That, too, is self-evident.

      Further, to claim, as Margaret would have it, that all “interpretations” are “valid” as long as the reader has been “conscientious”, implying an equivalency in worth to all “interpretations”, is, frankly, post-modern gobbledegook. Leaving on one side the problem of defining “conscientious”, it would mean that I, who know precious little about circa 1200 England or the Latin from which she has translated it, could have as “valid” an understanding of her latest With a Smile of the Heart as Margaret has herself.

      No, Margaret, I don’t believe you really think that. My “interpretation” would be worthless in comparison to yours, “valid” only to myself. In other words, the statement:

      There can be as many valid interpretations as there are conscientious readers who pay attention to the work of art. I say that any reader can interpret a poem as he likes, as long as he bases his interpretation on the art of the poem, namely, on its words.

      While we pay lip service to such ideas in order not to offend, it is to all intents and purposes meaningless and extremely unhelpful

      So it is with a Zen poem. Anyone can have an “interpretation” conscientiously arrived at––whatever that means––but, without study and exposure to the world of Zen, that “interpretation” is going to be of little value.

      Even defining a conscientious reading as one that takes account of the words doesn’t help unless that study and exposure are in place. This is shown here. Margaret takes the everyday, conventional meaning of “hitotsu”, but cannot see the meaning in Zen training. Why? Because, like me with circa 1200 English poetry, that’s not her area of experience. Thus, despite her conscientious reading of the poem, she misses this deeper level and ends up dismissing it altogether; whereas, as I have shown, for a Zen person it’s central to the poem’s meaning.

      James Sale thinks I have tried to tell Alena how to write her poem. This is a misunderstanding of what I wrote, again, revealing an unfamiliarity with the field. In my first post I asked Alena how she thought Basho might advise her about catching time. This question was, of course, in response to her longing to do so, and my posing it had nothing to do with getting her to rewrite her wonderful poem. It’s the kind of question a Zen teacher might ask a student. Indeed, “How do you stop time?”, or the instruction to do so, is an early koan designed to test and deepen the student’s satori, and I had taken advantage of the comparison with Basho to put the question to her, the answer being implied in what I had written before.

      Reply
    • Paul Martin Freeman

      To Joshua

      Sure, I have no problem with that. And given they’re both fine poems it could be a fruitful comparison. But only as long as we don’t lose sight of what is central to Basho’s poem which is the Zen. For that’s what’s happened here.

      Reply
    • Paul Martin Freeman

      To Alena

      Hello Alena

      My view is we should just be ourselves and seek to do the best we can to develop whatever abilities we have. That way we remain true to ourselves and authentic. As a westerner, your poetry (like mine), including your haiku, is likely to be dualistic. Culture, including religious traditions, and language will make it so. No problem with that. Your winning composition, on the other hand, to me reveals a fine poetic sensibility: it soars above the rest. That’s what the experienced judges recognised and with which I can heartily concur. It’s only the attempt to draw this “odious” comparison with a work from a different world with which I have a problem. Your poem doesn’t need to be justified by reference to Basho’s. And in the attempt to do so, its beauty, grounded in features characteristic of English, but not Japanese poetry, has been lost sight of.

      How sad in a competition dedicated to poetry!

      Reply
      • Alena Casey

        Paul, thanks for the clarification and for prompting this discussion. The interpretation of literature or art has been a passion of mine since I was old enough to begin to think critically. I dislike the notion that there are “Christian,” “Buddhist,” “atheist,” “feminist,” etc. interpretations. As you point out, calling the poem “Zen” is just a fact that anyone can say. When I speak of different interpretations, I mean more of what Joshua is getting at, which is that we each bring different contexts and cultures to our reading. I would not have called Basho’s poem “Zen,” simply because I didn’t have an understanding of Zen; it’s not a part of my mental framework. You could call it a blind spot. I am however capable of noticing what I called “a sense of calm” (or in the case of my own poem, “a sense of longing”). That is legitimate. It’s there, in the poem. But I gain a deeper understanding of Basho’s poem when I also gain understanding of the culture in which he was writing, ie, when I am given the vocabulary to express what’s there. And that’s the problem with coming into literary interpretation with an agenda–it puts our own vocabulary and context above the literature. But other commenters have expressed this much better below.

        But initiating a debate about agendas in literary interpretation wasn’t your goal when you originally commented, so I wanted to go back to the question you posed me: what advice might Basho offer me about catching time? I imagine he would pity me for this expression of “dukkha,” and invite me to release such longing and anxiety. Is there a sense in which the self is the cuckoo, the island, the swallow, even time itself?

        This all raises interesting questions about the source and purpose of human longing, which I imagine Master Basho and I would answer quite differently.

  22. James Sale

    It’s funny, isn’t it, just how many people are gaining a profound misunderstanding of just what Paul Martin Freeman is trying to explain to us (as, of course, a fully paid-up Zen Master) in so copious a fashion? But, then, who wants to argue with a Zen Master? I’d rather stick with the poetry.

    Reply
  23. Susan Jarvis Bryant

    I may be in the minority and my view may be unpopular, but being curious and daring by nature I am going to say it anyway. I find the points made by Mr. Freeman extremely interesting. I’ve always enjoyed and had a great deal of respect for haiku, and any further insights surrounding the exquisite and exotic intricacies of this form help me on my journey to full appreciation. The question posed to Alena on time has fired my imagination, and I am grateful for that.

    I too am confused by Margaret’s comment on critiquing literature and believe Mr. Freeman has made some interesting points. If “any reader can interpret a poem as he likes, as long as he bases his interpretation on the art of the poem, namely on its words” then surely a poem isn’t appreciated to its full potential because understanding the truth within the creation is secondary to one’s personal view. Isn’t the point of “words” in poetry to create a linguistic image that has aspects obvious to all… aspects steeped in history, culture, symbolism etc. all revealing the true nature of the piece. Shouldn’t we strive to seek the truth in our analyses. If we don’t, agendas creep into the education system… the colonialism agenda, the gender agenda… and the list goes on. I’ve witnessed such interpretations from lecturers educating students on Shakespeare… they are lies that I want no part of.

    I believe Mr. Freeman was merely pointing out that comparisons matter, and they should be true comparisons. I think he has a point. Am I wrong? This is a genuine and caring question from a poet who has learned much from the SCP and appreciates these discussions.

    Reply
    • Mike Bryant

      I agree, Susan. I do understand what Mr. Freeman is talking about. We make Herculean efforts to understand ancient Greek and Roman culture and poetry. Shouldn’t we also make efforts to understand Japanese and Chinese culture and poetry?
      As you’ve pointed out, in the very recent past our institutions have begun to interpret Shakespeare and every other notable poet and playwright in ways that push divisive ideas about colonialism, race, gender… the list is maddening. Is this kind of “interpretation” acceptable?
      Sure, anyone can interpret any piece of art in any way they like, however, as those who hold truth and beauty as imperatives, we at SCP must hold a high standard.
      In my opinion, “classical” covers more than just the Romans and Greeks.

      Reply
    • Joshua C. Frank

      What you say is also true. I think the difference is in interpretation versus imposing one’s own ideas, or as Bible scholars say, exegesis vs. eisegesis. For example, in The Republic, Plato pushed for the abolition of the family, speaking in the name of Socrates: https://la.utexas.edu/users/hcleaver/330T/350kPEEPlatoFamilytable.pdf As a Christian, I vehemently disagree. Yet what I don’t do is say he “really” was as pro-family as I am (the way some people claim that Jesus meant the opposite of what He actually said), or that Aristotle corrupted his writings (the way some people claim that St. Paul corrupted the teachings of Jesus). I read it and take Plato’s intended meaning at face value.

      All I can do is bring my limited understanding to the reading. That doesn’t mean I don’t make mistakes from my gaps in understanding (I’ve done this more times than I can count with Scripture), but it does show that everyone’s understanding of another’s writing will be limited, leaving room for interpretation. Yet, obviously a person can’t legitimately interpret The Republic as pro-family.

      The problem is that there’s no set answer as to how much room there is, so even answering that question is a matter of interpretation of basic principles.

      Reply
  24. Joseph S. Salemi

    The problem in questions of interpretation is that everyone has a private set of interests, and those interests often spirit him away from the actual meaning or intention of a long-dead writer’s text. This is certainly the case today (with a vengeance!) in absolutely off-the-wall critiques based on gender, race, class, colonialism, homosexuality, wokeness, or any number of other prejudicial approaches to literature. That’s Susan Bryant’s point, and it is valid.

    Private commitments lead to private readings. And everyone is tempted by that — Zen masters, devout Christians, militant atheists, Marxist ideologues, feminist harpies. The original purpose of the humanities as a field of study was to teach a student to read texts in a disinterested manner, and not necessarily as a way to confirm his preconceived ideas. And such teaching also aimed at allowing the student to read texts that presented him with alien and uncongenial things, while at the same time letting him appreciate them for their intrinsic beauty, structure, and charm.

    Can this sometimes lead to objective misinterpretations? Sure — that’s Paul M. Freeman’s point. OK, so what else is new? People are prone to mistakes. But a traditional training in what used to be called “humane letters” was supposed to make you an appreciator of well-crafted verbal artifacts, enjoying their comeliness and style while also (we hope) understanding the original meaning and intention of the texts.

    Things tend to go off the rails when readers become fixated on the three miseries — meaning, message, and moral. Then the text is judged on non-literary grounds, and is celebrated or dismissed solely on whether or not it confirms the reader’s religious or ethical or political commitments. This the worst way to read a literary text, but today it’s nearly universal among both left-liberal ideologues and their strongly conservative opposition.

    We often hear about The True, The Beautiful, and The Good. These are nothing but hypostasized abstractions! Like the three miseries, they have the unfortunate tendency to distract a reader from what a literary text is really about: delighting by its sheer perfection as a work of art.

    Reply
  25. Paul Martin Freeman

    Thanks to those who have written in support and to all who’ve contributed to this part of the conversation. I have tried to make the case for the missed importance in Basho’s Zen poem of the word “hitotsu” which in Japanese is used in ways to do with the idea of “oneness”. Margaret has explained that “shima hitotsu” means “a single island”. Adding to this, I have tried to suggest the word’s significance in the context of Zen training.

    Below is a translation of a passage by a Zen Master showing the centrality of the idea in Zen. I feel justified in quoting it because of the poetry in the story, but also, as some have shown interest in what I’ve written, as I shall explain, I have a particular purpose in mind which I hope they may enjoy.

    Now here’s the thing. IF YOU JUST READ THE PASSAGE, IT WILL BE ABSOLUTELY MEANINGLESS, ONLY AROUSING IRRITATION AND FURY! But, as a picture is worth a thousand words and Zen is always experience over intellect, I would like to suggest trying what Ippen does in the story. In other words, for a short period––even a minute––recite a brief passage that feels deeply significant. Ippen recites the Nembutsu, which is actually the invocation to the Buddha (“Namu Amida Butsu”) used in Pure Land (ie not Zen) Buddhism. But western readers might perhaps think of something like “Blessed are the pure in heart” or any short line of beautiful verse that has special meaning for them.

    To be clear, the point of the exercise is to get a taste of “hitotsu” as this is the only way to understand it. It’s an experience. Again, Zen is not a religion, so no one should feel they are being disloyal to their own faith or that it is threatened by doing this. As the Trappist monk Thomas Merton wrote:

    “you can hardly set Christianity and Zen side by side and compare them. That would almost be like trying to compare mathematics and tennis.”

    In theory, one could use just about any brief passage, but it’s better to choose something that brings about a peaceful frame of mind. I wouldn’t, for example, if you’re a Trump supporter, go for “Joe Biden is my president”!

    So, for those interested, the instructions are these: sit down in quiet place in an attentive posture where there are no distractions; close your eyes; take your line into your heart where you FEEL it; and repeat it aloud softly and attentively over and over.

    Here’s the passage with my explanatory notes in square brackets.

    Saint Ippen, when he was training under his teacher, was given the mantra Namu Amida Butsu as a koan. He practised the Samadhi of the Nembutsu [reciting the phrase “Namu Amida Butsu” invoking the Buddha, utterly absorbed in it] and then presented his view to his teacher in this verse.

    When I recite it, there is neither myself nor Buddha;
    Namu Amida Butsu – only the voice remains.

    The teacher did not give his approval to this, and Ippen plunged himself again into his spiritual exercises. Then he produced another verse:

    When I recite it, there is neither myself nor Buddha;
    Namu Amida Butsu, Namu Amida Butsu!

    Tradition says this verse was approved. In either verse the first line is well, but if we say the voice remains then the existence of the voice means a distinction between the man who recites the name and the Buddha whose name is recited, and real Samadhi [complete absorption/oneness] is yet far away. In the second version, the object and the self have become one in Samadhi. Yet another last line has been proposed:

    When I recite it, there is neither myself nor Buddha;
    The water-bird splashes in the water of the pond.

    This too has a flavour of its own.

    (Amakuki Sessan in A First Zen Reader, translated T Leggett p 119-120)

    Reply
    • Joseph S. Salemi

      Paul, your long and persistent arguments in this thread belie your claim that Zen is not a religion. It may or it may not be — but your insistence on hammering away at what Zen means, and what Basho meant, and your suggestion that all of us sit down and start reciting a mantra, sure sounds like religious proselytizing to me.

      When people are ferociously enthusiastic about something, that can correctly be called their religion.

      Reply
      • Paul Martin Freeman

        Joe, I didn’t think it would be for everyone, as I wrote, but it seemed the obvious thing to suggest to convey the meaning to those who’d shown interest.

        The question whether my three comments amount to being “ferociously enthusiastic” apart, you’re right, however, “religion” does have that other meaning!

        But am I not in good company here?!

      • Joseph S. Salemi

        So you’re accusing the rest of us here of being religious, while you claim the proud mantle of Zen indifference. That’s a good rhetorical trick. Did you learn it from your master?

      • Paul Martin Freeman

        You have distorted my meaning, self-evidently employing rhetorical tricks of your own, and laced it all with your own brand of venom and ignorance. Any dialogue with you, sir, is pointless.

        In the context of the story I quoted earlier, this seems appropriate: “Uma no mimi ni nenbutsu”.

        This conversation is closed. I have better things to do with my time than dealing with the abuse of an old bully.

      • Joseph S. Salemi

        I guess you’ve lost your Zen indifference at last.

      • Paul Martin Freeman

        Joe–and I hope Margaret will read this too–I sense the taunt in what you write, if now somewhat muted. But since this concerns the basic facts regarding Zen, and as I now seem to be its spokesman here, it’s probably worth responding.

        Your reference to “Zen indifference” is, in fact, precisely what I meant when I referred earlier to your “ignorance”. Like Margaret’s comment on Oct 5:

        “Your problem there is probably the word “thrilling” because you do not believe, from religious considerations, that Basho could have considered the flight of a bird thrilling.”

        it represents a common misunderstanding about the nature of Zen (and Buddhism), even, as I show below, in Japan. I should say clearly, having spent much of my life battling with my own misunderstandings, I see nothing shameful in having them. It’s just unfortunate when they become the basis for point-scoring.

        So here’s the point. Whatever the impression conveyed by images of monks with stony expressions sitting in meditation, Buddhism and Zen have nothing to do with shedding the capacity for being thrilled or developing indifference. The bubbly personality of the Dalai Lama should give the lie to that straight away, but here’s a story from my own experience which you might like. I always enjoy telling it.

        My first employer in Tokyo was Yamada Mitsunari, President of Nippon Shinpan, the largest credit company in Japan. He employed me to prepare for him a speech he was due to give at the inaugural meeting of a joint venture his company was setting up with First National City Bank. This was 1972. Mr Yamada was 66, which seemed very old to me at the time but now seems enviably young, and mostly we got on very well.

        Mr Yamada had the curious idea that he could learn English by some form of osmosis just by having my spotty face around wherever he went. This included at his daily golf practice on the top of his apartment block. One day, during his practice, he got tired and suggested–probably hoping to have a laugh at my expense–I give the ball a tap of my own. Now, I had been brought up near a crazy golf centre and had played cricket. So, even though it was my first time with a proper golf club, I took a mighty swing and clobbered the ball really hard. There and then Mr Yamada declared I was a golfing “genius” and that he would buy me a complete set of clubs. Later this was reduced to a half set, and in the end I got nothing. Instead, he sent me off to a practice ground, which I thought was a complete waste of time I could more profitably spend chasing Japanese girls!

        Mr Yamada had this strange way of gazing at you. Instead of looking in your eyes, he would stare at your eyebrows. Once, he volunteered the reason: “It disconcerts people,” he said, suggesting I try it.

        Anyway, one day, looking hard into my eyebrows, he told me this story about Kajiura Itsugai Roshi. Now, Kajiura Itsugai Roshi, Chief Abbot of the Myoshinji line of some 4,000 monasteries and temples, was one of the most esteemed Zen Masters of his day. As a young monk, he had famously sat in meditation for 18 hours on the edge of cliff. It’s a rarely attempted practice. The point is: you lose concentration, you die. I emphasise this to show he was the real thing: living breathing Zen.

        Mr Yamada knew Kajiura Roshi well as he was chairman of the council of donors that supported the Myoshinji line. One day, as he told me, he felt confident enough to confess to Kajiura Roshi what had been troubling him. “The problem with you monks,” he said, “is that you don’t feel anything.” In other words, he was ascribing to Zen people the same “indifference” that you do.

        What happened next would stay with Mr Yamada forever. “Kajiura Roshi positively exploded,” he said, staring deeply into my eyebrows. “I’ve never seen anyone so angry! I was really shocked!” (Actually, what he said was: “I shocked!”–the osmosis had not been working!)

        Anyway, if you’re still reading this, the point of the story is that Zen has nothing to do with being indifferent, or indeed with being joyless or not thrilled by the flight of a bird.

        In fact, it’s quite the opposite.

  26. Portly Bard

    Mr. Freeman —

    Your I-know-what-Basho-really-meant argument is out of place. It’s intriguing, but it’s not material to the contest, to its judging process, or even, by your own admission, to your assessment of the winning work.

    And what you are really challenging has very little to do with what Margaret has said or done. You are actually suggesting that a translator failed Basho’s work by not clearly vesting it in English with the Zen Buddhist philosophic intent that you believe Basho really cryptically meant in Japanese (but, like the poet he was, chose NOT to supply). And you are unfairly using Margaret as a scapegoat for that failure because she chooses to reason from Basho’s literal words and their likely poetic effect in English.

    Basho’s words say what he said and omit what he omitted. And in English they mean to each of us what they mean. Nothing more and nothing less. And there is nothing evil about that. We don’t need to step into his philosophic sandals if we choose otherwise.

    Margaret merely compared the “…dynamism of image and desire…” as she perceived it in the literal words of both works.

    The essence of that dynamism is:

    bird recognized

    flight observed

    reflection derived

    The works are strikingly similar in that generic regard, though the birds are clearly different, the flight paths observed are clearly different, the omissions are clearly different, and the reflections derived are clearly different.

    Margaret accurately described those similarities and differences simply to compliment Alena very carefully and very highly, recognizing comparable quality of phrasing and applauding Alena’s originality to implicitly affirm the absence of plaigarism..

    Margaret spoke to her perceptions of poetic phrasing, not to either Basho’s life philosophy or Alena’s.

    The contest was not about a Zen Buddhist picking the best Zen Buddhist emulation.

    You might see Basho’s “dynamism” intent entirely differently than Margaret does — and you might not have preferred the traslation she cited — but that doesn’t render Margaret’s sense of Basho’s literal English words — and their likely effect — invalid.

    The likelihood of you proving what Basho himself actually meant seems remote unless history has his authenticated explanation. You can certainly, however, where it’s material, purport and defend how you believe a devout Zen Buddhist is likely to interpret Basho’s words and omissions. And you can purport and defend how you believe a devout Catholic is likely to respond. And if you indeed prove such arguments, there are no doubt folks who will find your effort fascinating. But here, it’s immaterial.

    What you can’t do is tell someone else they have to go about comparing and contrasting the poetic “dynamism” in two sets of literal words on your terms.

    Where authors don’t fully say what they mean — whether deliberately or inadvertently — they indeed leave us each to surmise their intent from our own presumption or to ignore their intent and fashion their usefulness on the anvil of our own experience.

    Reply
    • Mike Bryant

      Portly Bard, SCP requires that you use your real name in comments. If you have a good reason to remain anonymous, please send an email to me or Evan, using your real name, with the reason that you should be considered differently than everyone else. Evan will decide whether you will be allowed to comment anonymously after we know who you really are.
      Thanks,
      Mike the Moderator

      Reply
  27. James Sale

    What are these pages and pages of ‘Basho Zen’ really about? The subtext reads: in Paul Martin Freeman’s opinion, he should have won! Sadly, for him, poetry is not about philosophy, religion and rationality; it’s about something completely different – and the best poem won: well done the judges!

    Reply
    • Paul Martin Freeman

      I didn’t enter the competition. Check for yourself. But I agree, as I wrote to Alena (October 6), her poem soared above the rest.

      Reply
  28. Sheila Barksdale

    Happy to see my haiku here in such good company and heartfelt thanks to the judges for giving individual commentary on each poem.

    Reply

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