*Trying for "one breath."
Her light is still on
when he returns home at night
to cold stew longing.
---------------------------------
A penny is tossed
from a frowning man’s left hand
into a fountain.
---------------------------------
A hummingbird halts
in sight of a Rottweiler
leering through fence wire.
Hi, you've got three good little poems here that show that you have a knack for capturing interesting situations and images concisely.
I do agree with entwife that it is good to see you try for the 'one breath' concept of haiku and I also agree with him on the need to drop the 5-7-5 format that a lot of people seem to want to stick to so rigorously. Though I am not taking anything away from your 3 poems written here, which as I said are all well written short poems. They are somewhat reminiscent of the poet Richard Wright who wrote thousands of what he called haiku near the end of his life. He was fairly strict in terms of sticking to the 5-7-5 syllable structure and a lot of them are excellent with very vivid images. When Richard Wright wrote his 'haiku' back in the 1950's it was still the norm to use 5-7-5 because there wasn't as much of an understanding of the Japanese language as there is today.
I think that it is generally accepted now that 5-7-5 is far too cumbersome to achieve the minimalist ideals of the haiku and it's 'one breath' concept. Part of the reason that I am quick to encourage people to avoid 5-7-5 is because I was a slave to it myself for years and was adamant that I would never change. Yet somehow I managed to see the light and it was like a revelation to be writing them in a different way.
There could be lots of other points made about the need for a seasonal reference and a cutting word for juxtaposition in haiku but they are probably far less important than the idea of brevity, minimalism and 'one breath'
Please don't consider the following as a critique on your poem as a short poem but more of a suggestion in terms of how it might appear if written as a haiku.
A hummingbird halts
in sight of a Rottweiler
leering through fence wire.
through fence
hummingbird spies -
rottweiler
I do enjoy your observations and use of images so I hope you intend to keep on writing some type of short form poetry, to which i think it is very well suited.
All the best,
Mark
(07-21-2014, 04:17 AM)ambrosial revelation Wrote: [ -> ]Hi, you've got three good little poems here that show that you have a knack for capturing interesting situations and images concisely.
I do agree with entwife that it is good to see you try for the 'one breath' concept of haiku and I also agree with him on the need to drop the 5-7-5 format that a lot of people seem to want to stick to so rigorously. Though I am not taking anything away from your 3 poems written here, which as I said are all well written short poems. They are somewhat reminiscent of the poet Richard Wright who wrote thousands of what he called haiku near the end of his life. He was fairly strict in terms of sticking to the 5-7-5 syllable structure and a lot of them are excellent with very vivid images. When Richard Wright wrote his 'haiku' back in the 1950's it was still the norm to use 5-7-5 because there wasn't as much of an understanding of the Japanese language as there is today.
I think that it is generally accepted now that 5-7-5 is far too cumbersome to achieve the minimalist ideals of the haiku and it's 'one breath' concept. Part of the reason that I am quick to encourage people to avoid 5-7-5 is because I was a slave to it myself for years and was adamant that I would never change. Yet somehow I managed to see the light and it was like a revelation to be writing them in a different way.
There could be lots of other points made about the need for a seasonal reference and a cutting word for juxtaposition in haiku but they are probably far less important than the idea of brevity, minimalism and 'one breath'
Please don't consider the following as a critique on your poem as a short poem but more of a suggestion in terms of how it might appear if written as a haiku.
A hummingbird halts
in sight of a Rottweiler
leering through fence wire.
through fence
hummingbird spies -
rottweiler
I do enjoy your observations and use of images so I hope you intend to keep on writing some type of short form poetry, to which i think it is very well suited.
All the best,
Mark
Thanks for this in-depth critique! I really appreciate the fact that you took the time to translate my attempt into what would be a more appropriate haiku; definitely one of the more helpful replies I've received in my brief time on this site. Cheers.