Each step into simplicity :: undoes the weaveGrant Hackett,
from Lilliput Review, #170
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue
little frog
watch out
fly tongues about
summer heat
a fly relaxing
on a frog's back
the tree frog's
tiny toes
touched by the dawn
one moon
one pond
one frog
sitting patiently
without a thought
the frog
a blade of grass
bends with the weight
of a tree frog
back and forth
over the lake
two frogs
mrs. frog
I was once
a tadpole myself
haiku festival
eleven frogs
hop on stage
frog chorus
none of the voices
out of tune
the teacher's drawer
has a frog in it
the class very quiet
all those frogs
not one
with a cell phone
jumping in
the frog deepens
the silence
the frog
jumps over
the moon
the biggest splash
of them all
Basho's
Each step into simplicity :: undoes the weave
Grant Hackett
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue
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
We meet :: when the poem turns dusk
Grant Hackett
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue
With Among the Flowering Reeds: Classic Korean Poems Written in Chinese, Kim Jong-Gil has performed an astounding acrobatic-like feat of translation, bringing to modern English speaking audiences a genre of poetry as lyrical, philosophical, and important as any in world poetry. These translations are exquisite in the sense that they are at once precise, evocative, poetic, and faithful to English, the language into which they are translated. Part of White Pine Press's "Korean Voices" series, which in turn is part an overall catalogue of some of the most outstanding poetry titles offered anywhere, Among the Flowering Reeds is a must read for those who love Asian poetry in its many glorious manifestations.
Why Korean poems written in Chinese, you may ask? The reason is that Korean as a written language (hangul) is relatively recent, dating back to the 15th century. Previous to that, classical Chinese, wen yen, was used in Korean literature, as it was for most East Asian literatures. Since there were significant differences in the two languages, the development of hangul became necessary. However, hangul as the written language took some time to catch on and writers and poets continued to use Chinese characters well into the 20th century. As a result, much of Korean literature was originally written in Chinese.
Jong-Gil's selection of 100 poems in Among the Flowering Reeds covers more than 1000 years, from the late 9th century into the early 20th. Jong-Gil notes in his introduction that, because of the nature of classical Chinese, he has had to take liberties with the literal sense of the words in order to capture the poetic and rhythmic quality of the original. How this has all been translated into not just competent, but lyrical, near flawless English is an accomplishment to be held in deep admiration.
Of the 100 poems I marked 27 as outstanding, to be returned to for further review. Many are written out as basic quatrains, whatever there original forms may have been. There is a quiet subtly to these works, delicate yet strongly resonant of life experience. Here is a small taste:
At My Study on Mount Kaya
The frenzied rush through the rocks roars at the peaks
and drowns out the human voices close by.
Because I always fear disputes between right and wrong
I have arranged the waters to cage in these mountains.Ch'oe Ch'i Wǒn
A stretch of blue water between the shores of autumn;
wind sweeps light rain over a returning boat.
As the boat is moored at night near the bamboo,
each leaf rustles coldly, awakening sorrow.Yi Il-lp
Through nearly fifty years in the lifespan of a man,
I have had little luck with my ill-fated career.
What have I achieved these years away from home?
I have returned empty-handed from so far away.
Still the forest birds warble kindly to me;
the wildflowers, wordless, smile to make me stay.
But the devil poetry always nags at me;
together with poverty, it it the root of all my grief.Kim Kŭk-ki
Now shine, now rain, and rain becomes shine:
that is the sky's way, as well as man's.
My glory may well lead to my ruin;
your escape from fame will bring you a name.
Flowers may open or fall, but spring doesn't care;
clouds will come and go, but mountains do not argue.
Men of the world, you must remember
you won't find happiness where you crave joy.Kim Shi-sŭp
Mountains rise over mountains and smoke from valleys;
the dust of the world can never touch the white gulls.
The old fisherman is by no means disinterested;
he owns, in his boat, the moon over the west river.Sǒng Kan
At an edge of the sky, I grieve for my youth;
I long for home, but home is still far away.
As spring lets loose the wayward east wind,
no one owns the wild peach, but it bursts into bloom.Kim An-guk
The chrysanthemums are slow to bloom this year,
I have found no autumn joy by the eastern hedge.
Heartless, indeed, is the west wind: it blows
into my greying hair, not yellow chrysanthemums.Sǒ Kǒ-jǒng
It's our task
we must take on
so much
discard so much
until finally
carrying just a little home
and on the way
losing that tooJohn Ajac
J. Bruce Fuller
Grant Hackett
Being mindful of the breath
until the breath
conquers the mind.
The current green.
The lily of water.Charlie Mehrhoff
Issa
David G. Lanoue
After weeks of working through nearly 500 haiku from 99 poets, I've made a final selection of 56 poems to be published in the 2010 2nd Annual Bashô Haiku Challenge chapbook. Though I received 3 times as many entries as last year, the task seemed a thousand times more daunting. I set no particular limit or had no particular length in mind for the chapbook, so the final selection represents only the highest quality of work I received. Last year's chapbook contained 25 haiku, making this year's over double the size. I would have been happy to publish another chap of the same size, but the quality of entries demanded a weightier book and I am even happier to oblige with that.
The winning poem comes from William Appel of Japan:
Leaf
falling off
the mountainWilliam Appel
I will let William's poem speak for itself, only saying that to evoke the entire macrocosm via one of its smallest components, in just 5 words, is a daunting accomplishment and the stuff of great haiku, indeed.
Jacek Margolak
Up the river –
a boat splits
the Milky WayEduard Tara
Terry Ann Carter
standing among the aspens just one of the grovePeter Newton
Dubravko Korbus
A good poem
Should smell of tea,
earth or newly split wood.
A few words piled together
To make something of a hut.Dennis Maloney
Constance Campbell
Grant Hackett
Oh
rose
that blew
apartStephanie Hiteshaw
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue
National Poetry DayThis being that fine occasion
to honor appreciative friends
with a wisdomy verse
pulled from one's hip
I am telling myself to first
keep straight my pockets
so as not to go
blow my nose into
William Carlos WilliamsRichard Swanson
Stanford Forrester
winter haiku
here, we have five or six
words for snow
and they all start with fuckMark DeCarteret
BecauseYou are tired, because I thirst for
salt, we turn to each other.
You are barefoot. It is winter.
This is going to be a difficult story.Gayle Elen Harvey
The grassy grassy grassy
--plain
reaches out across across the road
--the road
cutting man's lifeline in two two
trying trying to reclaim for mother
--nature nature
what is by all rights
hers and hers and hersMichael Estabrook
How Frightening to be the Malea pair of cardinals on my neighbor's
fence: the male--so bright, so eye-
catching, so out-there, so
dispensableKelley Jean White
When you've rent the flesh and sinew
from my supple skeleton and you've
sucked the last sweet drop of marrow
leaving lonely, brittle bones
will you save the jagged splinters
to adorn your chieftain's chest
or scatter them like toothpicks
over yesterday's dung.Sue De Kelver
Each step into simplicity :: undoes the weaveGrant Hackett
Albert Huffstickler
¶blue thorn gallop rose
why does language have to be so perfect?Charlie Mehrhoff
Ray Skjelbred
"It's too late
-to fall in love with Sharon Tate.
-And it's too soon
-to trace the path of the bullet
-in the brain of Reverend Moon."Jim Carroll
Autumn again
in the Japanese garden;
leaves
of last year's euonymus
burn still in my journal.
Years
after her passing
on the path
I greet my neighbor
in Mother's voice.Pamela Miller Ness
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue
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