‘Haiku is...the deep breath of life’ - Santoka Taneda

This abridged quote from the late Japanese writer of free-form haiku, Santoka Taneda, emphasises the simple depth of this contemplative poetic practice. A traditional Japanese haiku is a three-line poem with seventeen ‘on’ (or ‘syllables’), written in a 5/7/5 syllable count. Often focusing on images of seasonal nature, haiku emphasizes simplicity, intensity, and directness of expression. A ‘kireji’, or ‘cutting word’, is sometimes utilised to mark a sudden shift in the moment. Haiku is a practice of ‘seeing fresh’ the aesthetic and poetic quality of Nature and her seasons, in ordinary daily encounter. It is a contemplative practice of momentarily aligning eye, mind and heart on the same poetic axis.

The way of haiku is a return to Nature, a shy sketch from life of our moment to moment sense perceptions, that are otherwise carelessly tossed aside in favour of thoughts or ideas.  Haiku is a welcome return to a simpler state of childhood or infancy, when reverie and a more dreamlike experiencing predominated. It is a return to a fresh, imaginative response to life in and around us and a soft valuing of the pre-verbal images or sensations of things before ideas or thoughts are cooked up and overvalued in our momentary existence.  We return, in renewed innocence and humility, to express the rich symbols of our animated world. In that sense, we might freely appreciate once again the wise toddler’s claim that the rolling sea waves smell like a warm hug.

Like Zen or contemplation, there is a fine balance of effort involved in writing (or reading) haiku.  The light form of Haiku, the 5-7-5 syllable structure and focus upon seasonal nature, offers enough underlying form or scaffolding to quieten the discursive mind and enter into the not-knowing of beginner’s mind. It is to seek what is most intimate in our encounter with life.  In that sense, there are no ‘experts’ of haiku, only haiku that ‘hit the mark’. It is something of a remedy or method (or ‘ryoho’) to demote the everyday centrality of the separate personal self (or ego) in favour of an experience of the self in Nature.

Haiku has a seasonal focus reflecting our underlying existential awareness; That life is both fleeting and embedded in a harmoniously complex world of Nature.  This returns us to a simple and fundamental truth of our lives, beyond the personal, and invites us to rest in the momentary poetry of what might pierce our heart from time and place itself.  It is true contemplation, a renewed sensitivity, empty of sentimentality, to the natural landscape and rhythms of life. Haiku is an expression of the reciprocal exchange between inside and outside, a shy murmur of the lightning exchange of seeing and receiving; A sudden image of the moment.  It is perhaps, the still meeting point between personal spirit and the soul of the world, expressed in humble poetry.

In aboriginal culture, life and health depend on relationship to ‘looking after country’; The degree to which one is appreciating and caring for life in everything.  The practice of haiku promotes the ordinary as an essential feature of everyday life and develops our capacity for profound curiosity, and therefore care, about life in a wholistic sense.

Develop a haiku practice. Dedicate a small notebook and pen to the daily writing of a haiku to ‘look after country’ in your life. Perhaps start today.

Here’s mine today:

Dawn air, mosquitos

sitting counting breath 1…2…

Reality bites!

——-