Haiku by Slapp Happy: Issa's Sunday Service, #48

Master Issa

Of all the many suggestions of songs for the Sunday Service, nothing has surprised and delighted me more then this little ditty by Slapp Happy entitled Haiku. So delighted was I that I immediately went out and bought the track (that's the one you can listen to above), which is a live version of the original, which may be enjoyed in its entirety here.

The lyrics for connoisseurs:

HAIKU

We’re chippin’ at the moon with an old bone
Issa and her sister chip until the moon is gone
An endless row of wagons in the snow
Issa grabs her sister says c’mon let’s go ‘cause
Yeah, I think I’ll write a haiku
Well, you know as well as I do
You gotta, gotta have a high IQ
So eat this and have a cup of tea
Widow lighting lamps at cock crow
Sengai stamps to help his blood flow
From his brush figures rush
In the middle sits a poet
Almost smothered, almost crushed, crying
"yeah, I think I'll write a haiku..."
(Systole, diastole
Dealing with the parts but
Feeling with the whole.)
Yo!
Han Shan's tears, small worlds
In the wood a drop of blood
Hits an inky pond which ripples as it should...

Slapp Happy

A little song for Issa, with a guest appearance by Han Shan. Could it get any better on the Sunday Service? Well, I guess we'll have to see.



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While on this mini-sabbatical (I've have already laid out two of the 4 new issues, am working on the 3rd today, and am making headway with the poetry class presentation), it's been a pleasure to pass along info about new markets and calls for poetry. Since so many poets and poetry readers are cat lovers, here's a little something different that may be of interest: a "call for poems" for Catzilla:

A reminder to poets: Catzilla! an anthology of cat tanka is
now openfor submissions. Submissions will close on June
30. Guidelines can be found at:

Click for more details.

Please be sure and include 'Catzilla submission' on the subject line.

Reprints and originals may be submitted, as long as reprints
are accompanied by prior publishing information. No
simultaneous submissions.

Please click the above url for more details.



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Though no tanka writer, Issa frequently weighs in on the subject of cats, usually of the stray lover variety. Here's a little something different:

the winter fly
I spare, the cat
snatches

Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue

best,
Don