ROUND ONE

1
broken to my pain
swarmed with flies of misery
dying so slowly

2
Shiki paints Basho, Buson
and Issa enjoying
a picnic – laughing

Though one’s heart goes out to the author of #1, as the poem feels to me to be true-to-life, this is not the proper sort of material for haiku. In fact haiku works in exactly the opposite direction. Instead of focusing on the pain, misery and imminent death (which is ahead of all of us sooner or later), haiku demands that we step outside of these concerns, no matter how pressing, to see, to be aware of and finally to write about the world around us. Instead of giving attention to our own pain and grief, haiku leads our minds to the eternal world of nature, where life goes on in majesty, wonder and beauty. It is for this reason people turn to haiku in times of continual stress, to turn one’s back on the unpleasant to concentrate on something positive, even for the briefness of a haiku. I love the phrase "flies of misery" but again, this type of word-play is not acceptable in haiku usage. I would sincerely encourage the author to check out tanka – the similar form where the subject matter and the literary metaphor would be right at home. Otherwise the poem is well-constructed and follows all the haiku dictates. Ku #2 goes to the next round.

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3
Ivory Feathers,
Floating like frosted designs,
Frozen Paradise.

4
easter service -
the satisfying shine
of her first high heels

The many words with capital letters in #3 bothers me quite a bit. Also the word "like" in the second line is considered a haiku no-no – one should make the simile by simply putting the images next to each other. I am not totally sure of the author’s message, either. I suspect that "ivory feathers" stand for snowflakes. In haiku one usually just simply calls the thing what it is – snowflakes. I do like the image of "ivory feathers" so it is possible to combine the image if one could imagine a bird with white feathers standing in the snow. The Japanese have done this with white herons or cranes in a snowy landscape. My other problem with this ku is the repeat of "frosted" and "frozen" – haiku is too succinct to have this kind of waste of words. And, "paradise" is a human abstract idea, no matter how much we want to believe in such a thing, so it would be better to have an image from the world around us instead of this concept. Ku #4 goes to the next round.

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5
sandstorm
wakes the dead
blinding, their bones

after placing
ripe walnut on highway
raven waits on curb     

I love the thinking in #5 which tells me that haiku may not be the best genre for this kind of wisdom. There is a lot of new thinking in the poem that greatly attracts me. The idea that "sand storms wake the dead" is a valid thought through the idea that death comes from a lack of breathing and with the breath of wind the dust from decayed bodies is given a sort of life. I admire this thought, but the verse also has the addition information that these very bodies can then blind us, as we are in life sometimes blinded to the true beauty of persons or things by only viewing the body. May I say this is all "too good" for a haiku? Yet as soon as I say that, I feel that it is possible to somehow change the word order around in the poem to make a haiku say exactly that. Now I am wanting to make a haiku out of the idea with "waking the dead / the sandstorm blinds us / with their bones." This would at least get rid of the bothersome comma in the last line. Thank you for the good work, maybe it just needs a new haiku line order. Excellent and original thinking. Kudos! Ku #6 goes to the next round.

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The mouse looked
"Temptation" He thought
and with one bite he died of poison

8
frost fades
shingle by shingle-
autumn sun

Because haiku are short and pithy, it is a real temptation to use the form to tell little stories; ku #6 above does the same thing. But haiku are not about teaching a moral system nor educating the young. It is possible to tell little stories in this short way, but that that is not what haiku are "about." Haiku works by observing some facet of nature, combining it with another image, so that a third image is formed in the reader’s mind. Notice how many abstract concepts #7 needs: "temptation," "thought" (and who could know the mind of a mouse?), and how do we know the mouse died of poison – maybe his heart just gave out in an ecstasy of joy. There is too much assumed in this verse to be a good haiku. Ku #8 goes ahead.

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9
Flowers sway
Birds singing happily
Spring is now here

10
shrouded in mist
such a delight to fade
into eternity

The author of #9, with the capital letters beginning each line, emphases the short-comings of the poem – that there are three stops. It is almost as if there were periods at the end of each line. The mind hears them through the grammar, even though the author was knowledgeable enough not to put them there. Again the author makes an assumption about something – that the birds sing because they are happy. I know we like to think this but haiku demands that we only report on what we can perceive through our senses not what we think about them. To say that the bird sings because of happiness, implies that the author has used his or her intellect to think what the bird’s singing means. It could be the bird is made as hell because a rival has invaded his territory and he is establishing a borderline of song to warn him away. Or it could be a female bird, desperately lonely for a mate, is singing her heart out in a love call from the pits of loneliness. It is much safer to see the "flowers sway" and use that image. Ku #10 goes to the next round.

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11
ghostly water runs
under ice laden fingers
winter's frigid touch

12
dandelions bend
into the gentle rise, wind-
mill arms turn

With #12, I like what is happening in the poem, but I feel there should be another line or image. Even the author had some misgivings because he or she had to resort to two punctuation devices. There is good haiku material hidden here through the connection of the wind bending the dandelions and moving the mill wheel. I am also bothered by the haiku ending with a verb. Revised into good haiku form and line order, this one has real potential. Ku#11 goes ahead.

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13
A harkening bird
Rising to spring's choir practice
I sip on warm sky

14
Steam rises,
body submerged,
cleansed.

Somehow it feels very wrong for me to say to an author, "Haiku is not the place for you." and yet some persons are so very deeply into the ways of Western poetry that they have a long way to go to get themselves in haiku territory. Such is the author of #13. There is lots of "good poetry stuff" here – I especially love the idea of "I sip on warm sky" which is in some ways very factual since we sip water and it comes from the sky. Yet the use of "harkening" is such a cliché from European poetry and is basically wrong because harkening means "to be listening" and I feel this cannot be what the author means to refer to in the line. Also the idea that birds have "choir practice" as we do in our churches is rather unhaiku. Steam rises to the next round.

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15
the junkyard dog growls
at his own shadow flitting 
in the moon's pale light  

16
tornado touchdown
across the newly cleared field
dirt still clings to roots

I was just thinking how good everyone is getting about not making run-on sentences for haiku and here, boom! we have such a haiku at the end. But the author of #15 is right-on with subject matter and images and the natural world. I suspect the author is counting syllables which accounts for the idea of "moon’s pale light" being able to cast shadows. If one observes the scene one is describing, one can avoid this kind of error. And if he or she had had the freedom to leave out "pale" the verse would have been stronger and closer to reality. The "tornado touches down" in the next round.

2
Shiki paints Basho, Buson
and Issa enjoying
a picnic – laughing

4
easter service -
the satisfying shine
of her first high heels

I have the feeling that the wise author of #2 had the idea of putting all the names of the Old Masters of Japan in one poem as a no-fail method of being a winner. The person does know that Shiki painted and that to put Basho with Buson and Issa at one picnic can only be done in the realms of a joke or afterlife and gives the reader a clue for this at the very end – good move! Again the use of punctuation alerts me to a spot that needs rewriting. It would have been so easy to write the poem as:

Shiki paints
Basho, Buson and Issa at a picnic
laughing

One could also get rid of a verb – "enjoying" which is conjecture – and the third one in the ku. Ku #4 goes to the next round.

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after placing
ripe walnut on highway
raven waits on curb     

8
frost fades
shingle by shingle-
autumn sun

Ku #6 makes some interesting time changes (a technique much more at home in tanka). The haiku is accurately in the presence, but to get there, the author has to place the first line in the past. For the completion of the story, the reader has to be projected into the future (to imagine and deduce the reason the raven puts the walnut on the roadway). This is partly the result of "telling a story" which usually occur in the past and partly as a way of passing along information about the mind of ravens. Does one really need to know that the raven placed the walnut on the road? Could one have written this with the simpler idea that the walnut was lying on the road? For haiku this would have been enough, but I feel the author wanted readers to appreciate the intelligence of the raven that plans out his future meal with a past action. I feel that the author is more involved with thinking in writing this haiku than purely observing. Am I the only one who wants the middle line to read "a ripe walnut on the highway"? I do miss the articles sometimes. Check out how #8 gets by without them – and wins this match.

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10
shrouded in mist
such a delight to fade
into eternity

11
ghostly water runs
under ice laden fingers
winter's frigid touch

Again, I find #10 to be perfect tanka material. That is what tanka does best: comparing a facet of nature with a human occurrence or feeling. I know that as more people write haiku, and need a larger area of inspiration, it is very tempting to shorten one’s tanka inspiration into the haiku. It is very easy for me to appreciate a verse like #10 because this is the kind of thinking that touches me the very most. And yet, something in me wants this to stay in tanka and keep haiku with the ‘purity’ of its beginning. Sometimes I feel this is a losing battle and why keep trying to make a distinction. In general reading of haiku, I would not do this. But when a poem is entered into a HAIKU contest, one can and should draw these distinctions. Ku #11 goes ahead.

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14
Steam rises,
body submerged,
cleansed.

16
tornado touchdown
across the newly cleared field
dirt still clings to roots

Ku #14 has a total of three verbs and two nouns which tells me it is short one image. I understand what the author is saying (I think) and it is a valid haiku technique to portray something rising as contrasted with something sinking. I love the idea that through this process something is "cleansed" – which is new and very valid. There is just something in me that wants another noun in the last line instead of a verb. The commas and period are not necessary are they? Sometimes brevity is not enough to make a haiku work. The tornado blows ahead.

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4
easter service -
the satisfying shine
of her first high heels

8
frost fades
shingle by shingle-
autumn sun

While reading over these poems I have found myself smiling every time I read #4. The author does an excellent job of building to the "joke" or climax. The first two lines make the reader sure this is going to be a poem about a religious experience and yet the twist comes with the last two words. Good work! This haiku is so accurate for my girlhood and yet one usually thinks of high heels as dancing shoes. But the truth is, for girls who attend Easter services, that is when you get new shoes and not for the dance. The combination of Easter and new clothes is a completely proper and logical pairing. I wonder why the word "easter" is in lower case. Even though I whine and complain about the use of capital letters in haiku, I am okay with proper words having their caps. Somehow it looks "wrong" to see them without, which for me, detracts from the haiku. Ku #8 goes into the final round.

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11
ghostly water runs
under ice laden fingers
winter's frigid touch

16
tornado touchdown
across the newly cleared field
dirt still clings to roots

I see what the author of #11 is working with: the ideas of ice / ghost; fingers / touch, which are both good ideas for poetry. One always has to be careful using adjectives in haiku. Too often the author arrives at them intellectually instead of through sense perception, though the idea of "ghostly water" is right there on the border. One could argue it is a mental perception but it also could be indicated by the rising of the hairs on one’s arms that would make it a sense perception. I am wondering what the reference is for "ice laden fingers." Does the author mean icicles? To call them "fingers" hints a bit broadly at personification of nature. I know we speak of "winter’s touch" but to combine that with fingers of icicles broadens the personification beyond what I like to see in a haiku. I feel the author is trying to keep in the realm of nature but the use of the humanity words – "ghost," "fingers," and "touch" are all together too strong to take a prize in a haiku contest. Also the haiku has three indications of freezing: "ice," "winter," and "frigid" which are just a bit too much. Again the techniques and ideas in this haiku would be completely at home in tanka. Ku#16 into the winner’s circle.

8
frost fades
shingle by shingle-
autumn sun

16
tornado touchdown
across the newly cleared field
dirt still clings to roots

I keep wishing the author of #16 had reversed the order of the first and third lines. If I read: "dirt still clings to roots / across the newly cleared field" I begin to imagine a freshly plowed or bull-dozed area. Then, if I could be told, "tornado touchdown" the haiku twist would have happened in my mind as I switched from thinking that some human activity has happened here to the understanding that nature also does its own kind of "clearing’. As you can see by both the haiku entries that have come this far, they have the two parts of the haiku, the phrase and the fragment, they are in lower case, with a minimum of punctuation. I would have appreciated #8 just as much without the dash, but I would not disqualify it for having it. I just question if it is truly needed. Both of these haiku have quiet, gentle visions that are almost peaceful. There is a quietness (after the storm or the freeze) that delights and reassures the soul that gives the gentle joy of the spirit of haiku. Ku #8 wins.