icicle. new moon. cradle.

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icicle —
one clear word
out of all the murmuring

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new moon . . .
the map folded
with home at the center

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“icicle,” Modern Haiku 43.2; “new moon,” Frogpond 35.2

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Yes, well, as I was saying, I, along with all right-thinking people, spent last weekend in Mineral Point, Wisconsin, at the Cradle of American Haiku Festival, being entertained and delighted by my haiku compatriots. Or co-conspirators, or whatever they are. Among them Charles Trumbull and Francine Banwarth, who edit the two journals referenced above and were kind enough, in their most recent issues, to print these works of mine, which seem to have some bearing on our weekend activities. Clarity: I think we’re all seeking that, as we muddle around with this unwieldy language, trying out various combinations of words, trying to find those that will surprise and enlighten us. And home: when we’re not running away from it, we’re traveling towards it, and I think most of us who were in Mineral Point last weekend, even if we had left home to get there, felt that in another sense we had returned home. No one understands poets quite like other poets, and there’s nothing like being understood to make you feel at home.

Other reflections/observations/fond memories from this weekend:

• Charlie Trumbull gave us a thought-provoking paper on black haiku poets, many of whom were influenced in their work by the rhythms of jazz and blues. Which made me think again that we need to spend more time thinking about the musicality of our work, or at least the lyricism. It’s easy to forget, I think, that words are units of sound as well as meaning.
• It’s still amazing to think about how relatively young the English-language haiku movement is–our host for the weekend at Foundry Books, as always, was the inimitable Gayle Bull, whose late husband Jim, along with fellow professor Don Eulert, started the first English-language haiku journal, American Haiku, in 1963. That’s less than fifty years ago, for those who are counting. Don was at the conference this weekend too, visiting from California, where he uses haiku in his work training clinical psychologists. It helps teach them about objectivity, he says, which I found fascinating, since I’m crummy at being objective. Maybe I’m better at it than I used to be, though, I don’t know. I’m not objective enough to tell.
• If I studied sumi-e for the next four hundred years or so I might have a hope of being able to wield an ink brush with a tenth the skill of Lidia Rozmus, who set us up with the beautiful traditional tools of the Japanese ink painter and attempted to show us how to use them. She makes it look so easy, and I think she was sadly baffled by my complete lack of ability to paint something that did not look like a blob of ink. But since she is one of the world’s kindest people, she didn’t say so, just took my hand and tried to make it do something intelligent. I think it may be a lost cause, though–I have yet to discover any evidence that my hands are actually linked to my brain.
• Overheard at the wine bar where we were giving a reading on Saturday night, during a moment of almost complete silence when we were listening respectfully to the work of a fellow poet: “These haiku people are getting out of hand.”
• We had a rowdy session on gendai haiku on Sunday morning. It’s always fun to get people riled up about poetry before lunch on a weekend. If anyone wants a copy of my handout from the session, shoot me an email (reddragonflyhaiku AT gmail DOT com). Rest assured, I didn’t write any of it, it’s all quotes from other people, plus a selection of Japanese and English poetry that may or may not be gendai depending on who’s reading it and whether they’re squinting that day. You can let me know what you think. Hecklers, as always, welcome.

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The Cradle of American Haiku: Come see me…

…not to mention a lot of other people who are a lot more interesting than I am. I probably should have said something about the event described below quite a while ago–it’s happening in three weeks, which makes planning difficult for those of you who live at some distance from Mineral Point, Wisconsin. However, if you can make it, I cannot possibly recommend it highly enough.

The second event in this series was the first haiku conference I ever attended, two years ago when I was new to haiku and had even less idea than I do now what I was doing. I found myself surrounded by kind and talented and generous people, many of whom are now very close friends of mine and have supported me, challenged me, educated me, and generally made my life infinitely more wonderful. Most of them will be there again this time. I’d love to meet you too, if I haven’t already.

Important: If you’re interested in coming, please contact and register with Gayle Bull at the email address listed below. She is one of the world’s great hosts, but she’d like to have some idea of the number of people she’ll have to host.

And if you have any other questions about this event that aren’t answered below, feel free to ask me, I love to talk about it!

THE CRADLE OF AMERICAN HAIKU FESTIVAL 3

will be held in Mineral Point, WI, July 20-22. The Cradle Festivals celebrate the importance of the Midwest in the development of English-language haiku. The first Cradle Festival honored Raymond Roseliep of Dubuque, Iowa, one of the best of the early American Haiku poets; the second Cradle Festival honored Robert Spiess of Madison, Wisconsin, one of the best early poets and editors of English-language haiku journals. This Cradle Festival will honor the development of American Haiku magazine, the first magazine devoted exclusively to English-language haiku, started in Platteville, Wisconsin. Don Eulert, one of the founders of American Haiku, will be among the honored guests and presenters.

The three days will feature readings, presentations, food, and fun. Some of the presenters and panelists are Charles Trumbull, Jerome Cushman, Gayle Bull, Marjorie Buettner, Charlotte Digregorio, Francine Banwarth, Melissa Allen, Bill Pauly, Aubrie Cox, Mike Montreuil, and Lidia Rozmus. A complete schedule of events is below.

The fee for the three-day Festival is $45.00, which will include all the presentations, workshops, readings, and the Saturday night picnic. We encourage pre-registration to make it easier to determine the amount of food and the facilities needed.

Throughout the Festival, there will be coffee, tea, iced tea, water and assorted goodies on the front porch at Foundry Books for those who just want to sit, relax, talk and write.

We look forward to seeing you at the CRADLE OF AMERICAN HAIKU FESTIVAL 3. Check mineralpoint.com for accommodations.  If you have any questions, please contact Gayle Bull at info@foundrybooks.com.

SCHEDULE

Friday, July 20—
3:00 – 7:00  Registration (Foundry Books)
7:00 – 8:00 Opening Reception and Welcome (Foundry Books)
8:00 – ?  Open Reading (Foundry Books)
 
Saturday, July 21
8:00 – 9:00 Registration (Foundry Books)
8:00  Farmers Market at Water Tower Park (lots of good inspiration for Haiku came from this last summer)
9:00  Welcome (Opera House)
9:15 – 10:15 Charlie Trumbull — Black Haiku: The Uses of Haiku by African American Poets. From the earliest years that haiku has been written in the United States, African American poets have been among the foremost experimenters in the genre. The result has been, for the most part, a tradition of haiku writing that runs parallel to what we might call the haiku mainstream. This presentation will trace the history of “black haiku” in America, from the Harlem Renaissance movement of the 1920s and ’30s to the Black Arts movement of the 1960s and ‘70s to today¹s “blues haiku” of Sonia Sanchez and the jazz haiku of Kalamu ya Salaam and others. (Opera House)
10:30 – 11:45   AMERICAN HAIKU PANEL – Don Eulert, who with Jim Bull founded American Haiku magazine; Gayle Bull, Charlie Trumbull. Jerome Cushman will moderate the panel. (Opera House)
11:45 – 1:00 Lunch on your own
1:00 – 2:00  Marjorie Buettner –- There is a Season: A Memorial Reading, 2011 (first presented at HNA, Seattle, 2011). “Whatever circles comes from the center. We circle what we love.” Rumi. The memorial reading will have a combination of Powerpoint presentation, music, and a memorial flyer. It will be an hourlong presentation reviewing the lives and haiku of 22 haiku poets who have died in the past couple of years.

2:30 – 5:30 Breakout sessions
2:30 – 4:00 Charlotte Digregorio — “Polish Your Haiku for Publication.”  This workshop will include lecture, analysis of great haiku, and critique of participants’ work. Participants will receive training on the finer points of writing haiku to ensure that their submissions are first-rate. Handouts will include samples of haiku, along with an extensive bibliography and list of resource tools for haikuists to take their writing to publication level. Highly recommended for beginning and intermediate haikuists.  (Opera House)
2:30 – 4:00 Aubrie  Cox — “Why Did My Teachers Lie to Me?”: Teaching Haiku in and out of the Classroom. Teaching haiku can be both challenging and rewarding. We will discuss the fundamentals, benefits, and possibilities of teaching how to read and write contemporary English-Language haiku in classes, workshops, and on a one-on-one basis. (Pendarvis Education Center)
2:30 – 5:30  Lidia Rozmus — “One brush stroke.” Sumi-e and traditional haiga workshop by Lidia Rozmus. There will be 2 back-to-back sessions with each session lasting 1.5 hours.(Limit 10 per session.) (Foundry Books)
4:00 – 5:30  HAIKU WORKSHOP. Francine Banwarth, Bill Pauly, Charlie Trumbull, Jerome Cushman. This is a critique session.  Bring your haiku or just come and listen to some top poets and editors talk about haiku. (Pendarvis Education Center)
4:00 – 5:30 Mike Montreuil, Haibun Editor of One Hundred Gourds — TELL ME A STORY: Writing Haibun. The first half of this 90-minute workshop will present two Japanese Masters of haibun: Basho, the originator of the form, and Issa. A small discussion on why haibun lost its appeal until its resurgence in the late 20^th century will follow. We will also look at a longer haibun from Robert Spiess, who was one of the first writers of English North-American haibun. Next, modern and shorter haibun by Roberta Beary and Jeff Winke will be read. Finally very short haibun by Larry Kimmel will be presented. The last half of the workshop will focus on writing haibun. Attendees will be asked to either complete a haibun from a partially completed text that I will supply or write a haibun using their own ideas. I will ask those attending the workshop to rework them and then e-mail them to me, if they wish, so they may be considered for a future issue of A Hundred Gourds. (Foundry Books)
5:30 – 6:30  Free time
6:30 – 7:30 Midwest Picnic (Foundry Books)
7:30 – 8:30 Open Reading (Foundry Books)
9:00 – ? Public Reading at Wine Bar

Sunday, July 22—
9:30 – 10:30 Ginko at Pendarvis
10:30 – 11:30  Melissa Allen — Become a Motorcycle: Understanding and Writing Gendai Haiku. In Japanese, “gendai” means “modern,” and when applied to haiku this word signifies that a poem has moved away from traditional haiku poetics, whether in subject matter, structure, or language use. Bring a gendai haiku you have written if you have one (please feel free to attend if you don’t, and even if you know little or nothing about gendai!). We will briefly discuss the nature of gendai and read some well-known examples (such as the “motorcycle” haiku by Kaneko Tohta quoted in the workshop’s title); then we will discuss our own haiku and in the process try to understand better what is meant by “gendai.” (Pendarvis Education Center)
12:00 – ?  Lunch, ginko readings and closing remarks (Gray Dog Deli)