HCSHR 4:3 — Kurt Westley, The Rothrock Haiku Contest.
HCSHR 4:3 — Kurt Westley, The Rothrock Haiku Contest. Red Moon Press, 2020. 978-1-947271-68-5. 56 pages. 15$US. redmoonpress.com
Maxianne Berger and Haiku Canada reviewers
This collection of twenty pairs of haiku and their commentary are amusement in their own right, and kudos to Kurt Westley for having thought of this “contest” which he explains in the Introduction.
A jikaawase of 20 rounds ‘by’ two fictional haiku hermits, Waku and Woro, who each inhabit a temporal ‘hut of the phantom dwelling’ in the Rothrock State Forest in central Pennsylvania [. . . ]
Their haiku “are then judged by an anonymous evaluator/tenja who offers comments and declares the winning haiku in the spirited tradition of the classic haiku contest.”
The book, however, presents another use in the pairings: poets facilitating workshops can engage their groups to discuss the pros and cons of each haiku without any participant feeling threatened and so learn the language and decorum of feedback.
The book leaves a lot of space for readers to record their own responses and assessments of each pair of haiku, as well as the possibility of writing a haiku of their own, using the same topic or inspired by the poems on the page. Within this spirit, several poets who review for Haiku Canada accepted my invitation to comment on Waku and Woro’s poems of round four, as they would for any head-to-head haiku. Their responses follow.
Round Four: ‘autumn dusk’
Waku
a
coyote sniffs . . .
autumn dusk
creeping into every crevice . . .
Woro
autumn
dusk
a stolen scarecrow shirt
sways on a bare branch
Angela Leuck prefers Waku’s poem.
Poem #1: The first line arouses our sense of smell as the coyote “sniffs. “Creeping” cleverly links the second part of the haiku back to the coyote. The repetition of “cr” is pleasing. A memorable poem.
Poem #2: Why was the shirt placed in the tree, who put it there? This implies a backstory, whereas haiku is about a single moment. The four repeated “s”s in a row are too much, making the haiku a tongue twister. Woro is clearly referencing Basho’s “on a bare branch / a crow settles / autumn dusk,” but his version falls flat.
Dave Read, too, prefers Waku’s.
Waku’s “a coyote” is the stronger of the two ‘autumn dusk’ haiku. The use of “sniffs” in line 1 and “every crevice” in line 3 creates the impression the coyote is inhaling dusk itself. The coyote, therefore, is among the crevices into which autumn dusk creeps. Furthermore, as autumn is associated with midlife, its invasive nature in Waku’s haiku can be read as a metaphor of aging. Woro’s poem, on the other hand, is solid but unimaginative. The association of autumn with scarecrows is common in haiku. Due to its lack of originality, Woro’s poem falls short of the standard set by Waku’s stronger piece.
kjmunro, on the other hand, prefers Woro’s haiku:
To me, in the first haiku, the coyote is sniffing both a crevice & autumn dusk. Though evocative, this leaves a lot to the imagination & it happens over time — it is not a moment in time. Also, two uses of punctuation in one haiku isn’t usually recommended . . .
In ‘autumn dusk’, the stage is set with the first line, & then a vivid picture is presented. The words ‘stolen’, ‘sways’, & ‘bare’ add detail & evoke the mood — we feel the cold! (Is the scarecrow now bare?)
While I like things about both poems, Woro’s is better in my opinion.
Joanne Morcom sees the possibilities of both haiku.
Waku’s haiku is relatively quiet and peaceful, until the coyote makes a move. I like the hint of danger in the third line, and the alliteration. This one reminds me of a Western movie, with the coyote playing a key role. Incidentally, the soundtrack of The Good, The Bad and The Ugly resembles a howling coyote. There’s a touch of whimsy in Woro’s haiku, along with a sense of mystery. The image of a leafless tree wearing a shirt is quite amusing. But why is the shirt hanging on the branch in the first place? Did someone wear it and then throw it away? Or is a crow responsible? The possibilities make this haiku very memorable!
Sandra Stephenson finds them both a little too long.
There are lots of extra words in these two haiku, and undefined details that don't so much contribute to the mystery of dusk, as they contribute to imprecision of image. Reduce, reduce, reduce:
|
|
a coyote sniffs . . . autumn dusk |
a coyote on a bare branch |
You’ll notice that in Stephenson’s proposed revisions, “autumn” and “autumn dusk” have been elided. I can only think of the many, many times I’ve disappeared an originating image from a final version of a poem, it having served its purpose. Such a poem may no longer be appropriate for a themed contest, but remains in one’s “stock.”
The above comments from Haiku Canada reviewers illustrate different approaches to how one can discuss a poem. It is one of the reasons I see Westley’s book as a useful tool for workshops.
Oh, and in the book, how did the unnamed tenja evaluate these haiku?
Winner: Woro
Commentary: Waku writes of a coyote sensing the autumn dusk as an animate creature, but Woro is always the ‘trickster coyote’ imbedding sharp shards of mystery in his haiku: a bare scarecrow spine shivers somewhere while the stolen shirt (why?) simply sways ghost-like from a bare branch with a mysterious new life of its own.
Discussing what one likes and doesn’t like about a haiku is a good way to sharpen skills one can apply to one’s own writing. Westley’s book, because of its conception and organizing principle, is an ideal jumping off place.
Maxianne
Berger and Haiku Canada reviewers
February 2021
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