Wednesday, August 31, 2011

Josh Hockensmith: Wednesday Haiku, #33

Photo by 4028mdk09






Wednesday Haiku, Week #33



quince's new growth --
what color
does uranium burn?

Josh Hockensmith









heading for where
quince is scarce...
rose of Sharon

Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue






Japanese quince



best,
Don



Send a single haiku for the Wednesday Haiku feature. Here's how.

Go to the LitRock web site for a list of all 116 songs

Monday, August 29, 2011

Richard K. Ostrander: Monday Twitter Poem


Photo by Jason Pratt




One last sunflower
Barely beginning to bend
Before autumn’s embrace

Richard K. Ostrander
               Lilliput Review, #177










one by one
the tall bamboo shoots
bending
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue



Photo by jodarom






best,
Don



Send a single haiku for the Wednesday Haiku feature. Here's how.

Go to the LitRock web site for a list of all 116 songs

Sunday, August 28, 2011

He's Gone: Issa's Sunday Service, #116





Originally, today's Sunday Service was going to serve a dual purpose: to highlight the song "He's Gone" by the Grateful Dead and to point out a website that might be of interest to some folks: 30 Days of the Grateful Dead.

Unfortunately, the page is gone now (here's a nice summary of what it was) but, while it was available, the band posted a free song everyday for an entire month, over 5 hours of largely unreleased sound board material. About a month ago, I remembered the site and went and listened and it was great. Fortunately, I do have the version of "He's Gone" that was on the site and that's what you can listen to, above; I was particularly taken with it and, though not perfect, it is quite good. At nearly 14 minutes, it's a kickback and relax song to listen to leisurely and to appreciate for its many nuances - there is plenty of space in this song, that's space in a good, not noodley, way.

As noted at the Annotated "He's Gone" webpage, most American listeners would immediately think of Tennessee Williams "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof" when they here the line "cat on a tin roof" and that's how it qualifies as this week's featured song.

Finally, apropos of nothing in particular except perhaps that good ol' west coast music connection, a little something for an end of summer Sunday. As amazing as Jorma is on the guitar, bass players take note: Jack Cassidy took back seat to no one. Hot Tuna at their very best:






---------------------------------


This week's featured poem from the archive comes from Lilliput Review, #73, from November 1995. Enjoy.



Grey Rain Day
Grey rain day in Austin, Texas.
The soul slips in and out,
never straying far
as though fearing the rain might catch it.
I dream over coffee,
something in the back of my mind,
some final perfect thought
that eludes me finally
slipping away
into the grey rain air.

Albert Huffstickler









in straw raincoats
for the summer shower...
drinking part
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue





best,
Don



Send a single haiku for the Wednesday Haiku feature. Here's how.

Go to the LitRock web site for a list of all 116 songs


Friday, August 26, 2011

Walking By Myself Again: Santoka, translated by Scott Watson


I have great affection for the various lyric renderings by Scott Watson of classic haiku masters such as Bashō and Taneda Santoka; in fact, I've published a few of his translations, as well as Scott's own wonderful poems, in both Lilliput Review and on Issa's Untidy Hut. Let it, therefore, be duly noted that there may be some bias here.

Just sayin'.

It gave me great pleasure awhile back to receive a copy of Walking by My Self Again, versions of Santoka, by Scott Watson, from Japan's Bookgirl Press, and now being distributed in the US by Ce Rosenow's Mountains and Rivers Press.

The abstract of this review is as follows: this is a book that belongs on the shelf of any Eastern poetry aficionado, a book that in its straightforward power and simplicity can turn the head of anyone who appreciates the essence, the core, of what drives a poet to scratch or tap or sing a few words into life.

Into life.

Scott's renderings bring an astute sensibility to a poetic task: translating a master poet. I have read enough Santoka translations to know that these are very different indeed, and, I am happy to report, different in a very good way.

Here are 5 one-lines renditions from early in the book



left as they fall tea flowers falling is all

whatever it all is it all is blossoming

in rain camellia flowers not yet falling

all day too noone came fireflies

able to meet again camellia in bloom



If I might be so bold as to call these perfect - these are perfect. Perhaps, they are not perfect translations - I can't argue that, I don't know the language. D. T. Suzuki might disqualify me from even reading the poem, so there is that.

So, you probably shouldn't be paying any attention to me.

However, these poems, as a meeting of the minds and hearts of Santoka and Watson, a dovetailing of the English and Japanese languages, these poems are as near perfect as someone who has no qualifications to say so can ascertain.

The first three are precise poems of the moment, a moment perfectly captured. Poem four isolates an all too pervasive feeling. Poem five is a fine blend of the human and the natural, each aspect, in its essence, experiencing the exact same is-ness so well delineated in the first four.

Another beautiful poem of the moment, as imagistic in its own way as the fine work of Buson is:

neither waiting
nor not waiting
moonlight weeds

I love the double negative of the 2nd hinge line, reminding me somehow of a Dutch door swinging both ways. The Way that is not the way is the way. Which way? This Way:


pine boughs all drooping hail Buddha


One does not often hear of the compassion of Santoka, certainly not as often as one hears of Issa's. Yet next is a poem full, over-full, with compassion for a fellow spirit:


it's that always-tied-nothing-but-barking-to-do dog


Oh, I remember what it's like to be tied up in the backyard like that, all day, everyday. You, too? To forget that is to forget our humanity, to forget everything, really. This is about your soul.

I believe I'll leave it there; to end on a note of compassion is, truly, not to end at all. The way that is The Way.


-----------------


This week's poem comes from Lilliput Review, #171, from December 2009. Enjoy.




intricacies
of life
lines of ants
in & out
the grounded hull
of a cicada
David Gross








big caterpillar--
into the ants' hell
it has fallen
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue





best,
Don



Send a single haiku for the Wednesday Haiku feature. Here's how.

Go to the LitRock web site for a list of all 115 songs

Wednesday, August 24, 2011

Wednesday Haiku, #32: Michael L. Newell

 Photo by עירא




Wednesday Haiku, Week #32



crooked smile in mirror
my father's ghost
Michael L. Newell









the hand that broke off
the plum blossom branch...
in hell's mirror
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue





Detail of Emma, King of Hell by Yoshitoshi




best,
Don





Send a single haiku for the Wednesday Haiku feature. Here's how.

Go to the LitRock web site for a list of all 115 songs

Tuesday, August 23, 2011

Alan Watts: the Animated Biography


According to the Marin Independent Journal, Alan Watts's son, Mark, is working on an animated biography of his well-known father.  Here's a teaser entitled "Music and Life" to give a feel for the project:




Please note, the animators for this particular segment: Parker and Stone, of South Park and, now, Book of Morman fame.  The Marin article, above, explains their involvement in the project and what the film, entitled "Why Not Now," will be comprised of. 

Oh, happy day, indeed!   Why not now?  How about a little nothing?  Here you go.







nothing at all
but a calm heart
and cool air
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue







best,
Don



Send a single haiku for the Wednesday Haiku feature. Here's how.

Go to the LitRock web site for a list of all 115 songs

 

Monday, August 22, 2011

Ed Markowski: Monday Twitter Poem

Photo by McKay Savage





temple path
tree branches point
in every direction
Ed Markowski
                                                              from LR, #178







mountain temple--
all the buildings strewn
with red leaves
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue







best,
Don


Send a single haiku for the Wednesday Haiku feature. Here's how.

Go to the LitRock web site for a list of all 115 songs

Sunday, August 21, 2011

"Don't Fear the Reaper": Issa's Sunday Service, #115

Buck Dharma ,created by G. Lorbes




I don't think we've had too many real blockbuster songs on the Sunday Service, but "Don't Fear the Reaper" definitely fits the bill. It's literary connections with Stephen King are well documented. So iconic is it that, until I heard it again recently (it tends to pop up on summer rock radio), I'd forgotten about the "Romeo and Juliet" allusion, which is what puts it square in the sights of the this ongoing series.

A song essentially about how love conquers death and written by Blue Oyster Cult's lead guitarist, Buck Dharma (Donald Roeser), the opening 5 lines should be of interest to those familiar with Eastern verse:


All our times have come
Here but now they're gone
Seasons don't fear the reaper
Nor do the wind, the sun or the rain
We can be like they are


That's a sentiment that even the classic haiku masters wouldn't argue with and the chord struck here might be universal enough to explain the song's initial success and persistent staying power. "Romeo and Juliet," it turns out not surprisingly, is one of the most persistent allusion in rock: this is the 4th song in the list that refers to it (& there are more to come, I'm sure - suggest one and get the two current issues of Lilliput Review free) - here and here and here are the previous three.

So as not to give short shrift to the original, here is a fine excerpt of one of the best, most popular versions of the play ever produced. The intensity of Zefferilli's two young actors captures it all:







--------------------------------------


This week's selection from the Lilliput archive #76, way back in the land of January 1996. Alan Catlin is something of a master poet, here singing of another master of art.




Poem Inspired by Hokusai
Hokusai
sketches the whole
of the earth
emerging from the sky.
Alan Catlin







mountain's red leaves
the setting sun returns
to the sky
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue









best,
Don




Send a single haiku for the Wednesday Haiku feature. Here's how.

Go to the LitRock web site for a list of all 115 songs

Friday, August 19, 2011

90 Frogs - karma tenzing wangchuk



The copy, pictured above, is actually the second edition of 90 Frogs by karma tenzing wangchuk, published as the first chapbook in Stanford Forrester's bottle rockets chapbook series.  Stanford provides a wonderful introduction on the composition of the original edition, which was produced by tenzing in 4 days for his mother's 90th birthday.  Not only did he present her the book but on the train on the way to visit her, tenzing made 90 origami frogs and wrote one poem on each to present to his mother on his arrival.


little frog
watch out
fly tongues about


There are any number of the poems in this collection which show the influence of the ever compassionate Issa.   Particularly when the poems directly address life forms, as with this "little frog" above, they have that timbre.


summer heat
a fly relaxing
on a frog's back



The ironical juxtaposition here of two natural "enemies" is delightful to all, except perhaps the frog.


the tree frog's
tiny toes
touched by the dawn



Time and again, tenzing's power of minute observation evinces itself, powerfully juxtaposed by the extreme minimalist of description.  What feels most impressive to me about these poems is their timeless quality; truly, as well done as they are, they could have been written by one of classic masters.


one moon
one pond
one frog



The poet here seems to tip his hat to all the possibilities of the situation, including Bashō's.


sitting patiently
without a thought
the frog



This poem nicely posits a response to critics of the anthropomorphic strain found in Issa's work, which also appears in some of the tenzing's poems in this collection.  Lighten up and laugh, folks, knowing full well what you (don't) know.


a blade of grass
bends with the weight
of a tree frog



Somehow, we feel the weight, light as it is.  And see it, too.  Truly, there is so little to say about tenzing's poems that they don't already more succinctly and more powerfully say on their own.  I'm just going to get out of the way of the next two:


back and forth
over the lake
two frogs



mrs. frog
I was once
a tadpole myself


Try this one on for size:


haiku festival
eleven frogs
hop on stage



Having just attended a haiku festival, I can tell you there is a lot of hopping around onstage.  This, however, is another timeless haiku; literal, it may be, and figurative it definitively is


frog chorus
none of the voices
out of tune



This poem shares a kinship with "waiting patiently," above - it is simple, wonderful truth


the teacher's drawer
has a frog in it
the class very quiet



Here is a moment perfectly captured.  The silence can be heard.


all those frogs
not one
with a cell phone


Ha!

Finally, three more which all, in one way or another, look back on their ancient precursor:


jumping in
the frog deepens
the silence


the frog
jumps over
the moon


the biggest splash
of them all
Basho's


This volume, of which this is just a small selection, is truly a classic of our time.  It is so rich, so resonate, and so spot-on it really is hard to believe that it has slipped out of print for a second time.  tenzing informs me that, down the line a ways, there is a possibility of another reprint.

In my view, it can't be soon enough.


-------------------------------------


This week's selection from the Lilliput archive comes from #170, July 2009 and it is a powerful monostitich by the fine poet Grant Hackett.  Enjoy.




Each step into simplicity :: undoes the weave
                           Grant Hackett






he likes the grass
of my umbrella-hat...
flitting firefly
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue




best,
Don



Send a single haiku for the Wednesday Haiku feature. Here's how.

Go to the LitRock web site for a list of all 113 songs


Wednesday, August 17, 2011

Wednesday Haiku, #31: David Giannini

Photo by Snowmanradio




Wednesday Haiku, Week #31




Birds
the first way
earth spoke through the sky

David Giannini








after the big flock
silence...
geese flying north
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue





Photo by Anne Burgess





best,
Don




Send a single haiku for the Wednesday Haiku feature. Here's how.

Go to the LitRock web site for a list of all 114 songs

Monday, August 15, 2011

Yamanoe no Okura: Monday Twitter Poem






    Waka
Simple,
homely as a wristband made
of woven grass
...yet I would live
a thousand years.

   Yamanoe no Okura 
   translated by Gary LeBel
                                               from Lilliput Review #180








he likes the grass
of my umbrella-hat...
flitting firefly
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue




best,
Don


PS  Since the blog folks haven't been able to play when it comes to the Monday Twitter poem, if you don't have Twitter and Facebook, I decided to start posting it here, too, without additional cross-postings.  Enjoy.


Send a single haiku for the Wednesday Haiku feature. Here's how.

Go to the LitRock web site for a list of all 114 songs


Sunday, August 14, 2011

Le Pastie De La Bourgeoisie: Issa's Sunday Service, #114



This has got to be the only song (and I know as I type this someone will find another ... or write one on the spot) that mentions both Judy Blume and Jack Kerouac together . Indie darlings Belle & Sebastian have their way with modern culture; throw some J. D. Salinger in the mix and you're good to go. The title is a bit of a thunk for those terminally French challenged and, in fact, for those not. Go figure, it seems to be implying.

Or perhaps simply we are dwelling in the land of the unreliable (song) narrator? Certainly not the unreliable song writer.

Le Pastie De La Bourgeoisie

Sunbeam shone, mousy girl on the end pew
You'd stay home, oh if only they let you
Le Pastie de la Bourgeoisie

Municipal pool, you're a junior life saver
But you're friends are all serious ravers
Le Pastie de la Bourgeoisie
Reading Judy Blume
But you came too soon

You're too tall, much too tall for a boyfriend
They run and hide, from your buck tooth and split ends
Don't be scared, like the books you've read
You're the heroine
You'll be doing fine

Wouldn't you like to get away?
Bestowing the memory of good and evil
On the ones you left behind
The heartless swine

And you love like nobody around you
How you love, and a halo surrounds you
Le Pastie de la Bourgeoisie
In the Autumn cool
Say cheerio to school

Listen Dear, I've been watching you lately
If I said all these things you would hate me
Le Pastie de la Bourgeoisie
At the church bazaar
I nearly went too far

Wouldn't you like to get away?
Give yourself up to the allure of
Catcher In The Rye
The future's swathed in Stars and Stripes

Wouldn't you like to get away?
Kerouac's beckoning with open arms,
And open roads of eucalyptus
Westward bound

However it shakes down, it's catchy as all get out and drops enough names to keep everyone on tip-toe.

Here's a fine live version from the Lowlands Festival in 2006:





------------------------------------------

This week's selection from the Lilliput Review archive comes from issue #77, way back in March of 1996. Enjoy.



Names
If I had to choose
just one name
to give a girl child,
it would be Mary,
placing her at
the center of all sorrow
which is to say
where all hope waits.
Albert Huffstickler








cherry blossoms--
around grandpa's waist
a name tag

Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue




best,
Don



Send a single haiku for the Wednesday Haiku feature. Here's how.

Go to the LitRock web site for a list of all 113 songs

Saturday, August 13, 2011

Call for Poems: Lilliput Review



Lilliput Review is looking for poems.  Here's the guidelines for sending.  Pass the word.

Guidelines: All poems submitted should be 10 lines or less, with a 3 poem maximum per submission.   All manuscripts must be accompanied by a SASE (self-addressed, stamped envelope) or IRCs (international reply coupons) with sufficient postage for their return or they will be placed in the trash.  All poems should be previously unpublished, unless noted.  Payment for work accepted is 2 copies of the issue in which the work appears.  Reporting time is 90 plus days. No electronic submissions considered.





 A little Steve Cropper while I wait ...








tucking her in
out I go...
summer moon
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue




best,
Don



Send a single haiku for the Wednesday Haiku feature.  Here's how.

Go to the LitRock web site for a list of all 113 songs


Friday, August 12, 2011

Haiku North America Conference, Seattle 2011: a Few Thoughts

Artwork by Ruth Yarrow


Above you will see a fine drawing (plus conference badge) by the wonderful Ruth Yarrow which exemplifies in my mind the generous spirit of the participants at the 2011 Haiku North America Conference in Seattle.  Thanks, Ruth, for a fine likeness.

Being in Seattle for a week is the reason I've been keeping a low profile on the blog and elsewhere; I had done a few posts ahead, but was nowhere as together as my fellow haiku blogging panelists Melissa Allen, Gene Myers, and Fay Ayogi, at least two of whom were posting live from the conference (while I and my 10 thumbs were wrestling with a small HP notebook).


Photo by Johnny Baranski


And a little closer view of the panel on haiku blogging:


Photo by Sarah Myers


In addition to the haiku blogging panel, I participated on a panel called "Developing Haiku Book Manuscripts" with some serious heavyweights in small press haiku publishing: Jim Kacian, Ce Rosenow, and Charlie Trumbull.


Photo by Johnny Baranski

The perspective I added to both panels was the POV of a micropress publisher.  As a one person operation, everything, including blogging and manuscript development, is seen through the other end of the telescope.  I'm not sure how helpful that was for the audiences at both sessions but I can say I learned from my fellow panelists.

There was a nice balance between the practical and what might be termed the academic.  Even on the later end of things, Richard Gilbert in the conference's most scholarly presentation ("Social Consciousness and the Poet's Stance in 21st Century" - the 1st William J. Higginson Memorial Lecture) was so well grounded in the history and tenets of haiku, as well as the sensibility of the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics at Naropa where he studied, that one never got lost in the morass of ephemera.   He was engaging, knowledgeable, and obviously an all round good guy.

There were so many excellent panels and presentations that there were the usual conference schedule conflicts (an embarrassment of goodness) and I wasn't able to attend some I would have liked to.  Highlights that I was able to catch included Jim Kacian on the history of the one-line haiku ("Monophilia"), Cor van den Heuvel's powerful reading from his new book, A Boy's Seasons: Haibun Memoirs,  Carlos "The King" Colon on concrete haiku and poetry, and Eve Luckring's phantasmagorical video renku (with a tip of the hat to Sergei Eisenstein and the avant garde).  Day 3 was packed with great presentations: the year's memorial reading for those who died by Marjorie Buettner was memorable, and Daivd Lanoue's "Frogs and Poets" on Issa was my favorite of the conference, balancing as it did whimsy and scholarship in just the right proportion. The final day also saw Paul Miller give a provocative talk on Gendai (modern) Haiku in the West and the delightful "Old Pond Haiku Comics" by Jessica Tremblay (whose weekly postings I will be following with great interest) was just the perfect way to cap things.

I was sorry to miss Charles Trumbull's "History of American Haiku" and Penny Harter's session on haibun, the later because of a conflict and the former because we had to be up at 3 am for the return flight.  Between the two panels I was on and the various sessions I attended, I also gave two brief readings (one open and one for poets with new haiku books) and helped judge a kukai contest among participants along with Carmen Sterba.

Lots to think about, lots to absorb, and lots to just plain enjoy.  In off time, I traipsed about Seattle with my mate and friends, hitting the bookstores, restaurants, museums and bars and having an overall great time.  I'd like to particularly thank Michael Dylan Welch, Tanya McDonald, and Tracy Koretsky for their kindness and organizational acumen, along with Susan Diridoni, Gene Myers, Melissa Allen and Cherie Hunter Day for variously pleasant conversations, lunch, and camaraderie.

Finally, for those of you who didn't get to delight in this particular piece of cheese (on Facebook), well, here you go:




-------------------------------


This week's poem, from the Lilliput archive comes from#169, July 2009, is more than a little bit of wonder.  Enjoy.




     All of This, and Being Too
Flowering now of now, splayed flat
by winds of specificity,

what comes forth in this blossomed
gust is not regret, not sorrow.

What comes forth when the battered
leaves of nakedness curl downward,

flowering now of now, is you,
is your steady, petalled comingness.
        Diane O'Leary









with one gust
it becomes the perfect
willow
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue




best,
Don



Send a single haiku for the Wednesday Haiku feature.  Here's how.

Go to the LitRock web site for a list of all 113 songs


Wednesday, August 10, 2011

Wednesday Haiku, #30: Susan Diridoni






Wednesday Haiku, Week #30





lilac creek trilling all the hours
          Susan Diridoni










downstream, the gate
to knowledge...
evening's red leaves
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue








best,
Don


Send a single haiku for the Wednesday Haiku feature.  Here's how.

Go to the LitRock web site for a list of all 113 songs

Friday, August 5, 2011

White Pine Press and Some Rare Poetic Gems




Dennis Maloney of White Pine asked me to pass along the following info ... a big sale of incredibly rare poetic gems from his personal collection, all to support one of America's finest small presses.  Here's his notice:

White Pine Press founder Dennis Maloney is selling off his forty year collection of signed and first editions of poetry and more to raise funds to support White Pine Press. The sale includes significant collections of several poets including Gary Snyder, Robert Bly, Tomas Transtromer, Michael McClure, Philip Whalen, Pablo Neruda, Wendell Berry, a selection of early work by Native American poets and smaller selections of many other authors.

White Pine Press, is a non-profit organization, and sales of material donated to a library or other institution or purchased for above the fair market value of the items will be eligible for a tax deduction. For additional information, questions, or purchases please email Dennis Maloney at dennismaloney@yahoo.com.
A list of titles maybe found at
http://www.whitepine.org/booksale.php


---------------------------------------------


I'm sure you've noted that the last two weeks have been a little light @ The Hut.  In keeping with this approach a while longer, I'd like to share this live performance, which is as good if not better than the original (and that is saying something), of an early rock classic by San Francisco's We Five:





There is something about this tune that has always reminded me of "Walk Right In" by the Rooftop Singers, so, hey why not:




If you can ever point to a handful of cuts that bridged the folk revival of the late 50s to the burgeoning rock and roll scene of the 60s, this certainly is one.

By the way, I just love these YouTube folks who show a 45 playing for the duration of the song.  One thing that can be said, the sound of this one is certainly HQ.

Finally, since there won't be a Sunday Service this week, I can't resist slipping in another song, one I happen to be listening to right now:










As to why things have been a tad on the lightweight side, I hope to be addressing that in full in the coming week or two, so stay tuned.

------------------------------

This week's dip into the archive is from March 2009, Lilliput Review, #168, and finds us at that most magic of moments, when all the best poems are written, all the great thoughts conjured, all the greatest loves declared, and all the passing on of things noted: twilight.  Enjoy.




We meet :: when the poem turns dusk
           Grant Hackett








now I watch
with careful attention...
autumn dusk
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue






best,
Don






Send a single haiku for the Wednesday Haiku feature.  Here's how.

Go to the LitRock web site for a list of all 113 songs

Wednesday, August 3, 2011

Wednesday Haiku, #29: Bart Solarczyk









Wednesday Haiku, Week #27





in the mirror
I am dog
obey me
Bart Solarczyk








nightingale--
even the rascally dog
howls for love
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue











Send a single haiku for the Wednesday Haiku feature.  Here's how.

Go to the LitRock web site for a list of all 113 songs