Editor's Choice Haiku

April 2014

EDITOR’S CHOICE HAIKU

spring cleaning —

this futile search for

my lost youth

Gautam Nadkarni

There are two excellent haiku poems submitted for this issue which talk about “spring cleaning” and they won the first and second places for the Neo-classical haiku section. Both go deeply into the depths of existential realities of us human beings and the kigo, spring cleaning, is playing a pivotal role of enhancing the sentiment to a dramatic degree. I have chosen Gautam Nadkarni’s haiku.

What a lot these three lines can and do narrate! And yet they leave at the same time vast room for the reader’s imagination. If a haiku has both of these aspects it is more likely to be a good one because it is rich in contents. They preach “Show, don’t tell”. I have always been slightly concerned with, doubtful about and even irritated by this dogma. If it is trying to say, “Don’t explain”, it is indeed a very good advice and really spot on. If it is trying to say, “Express not by theory but by examples”, it is even better an advice and should be pinned on the wall or etched on your haiku notebook.

However, if the doctrine is trying to say, or even dictating, that telling others what you think, feel or perceive in the haiku form is a sin never to be forgiven, and that you should therefore merely show what you are talking about, leaving all the interpretations to the reader’s imagination, it is one of the most grievous and pernicious sin ever committed in haiku teaching. Most unfortunately, this seems to me to have been precisely how most haiku poets have understood the doctrine to mean and most of those most haiku poets have actually put it into practice most diligently, literally, meekly and passionately with a religious fervour. The result is, quite unsurprisingly, many a decade of showing this, that and the other anywhere and everywhere in the world in the “hollow” shape of haiku but without a story to tell, sensibility to share, deep feelings to divulge, or valuable experiences to enlighten others. In short, they are empty.

This is further compounded and made worse by another worrying trend, i.e. minimalism. Using too few words after chopping off even essential ones, the minimalist haiku poets make the already obscure and vague haiku even more so.

If we abide by the doctrine and look at the haiku poem by Gautam Nadkarni, we would be obliged to judge that it is against the rule and should therefore be condemned. The author is “telling” us that the search has been, and still is, “futile”, which we are not allowed to think otherwise. The author’s youth is “lost”, we are “told”, and that’s that. The author is in its own world, sharing nothing with us, and there is no connection between the author’s subjectivity and the reader’s imagination. What a futile comment about such a rich haiku! The kind of haiku which would come out from such poor understanding of haiku might be something like:

spring cleaning –

searching for

my youth

Even this version is far better than the usual kind of haiku we are exposed to all the time. It is simply because its original version is excellent, making it difficult for its poor alternatives to be bad.

Spring connotes youth and life as opposed to the advancing age. Spring cleaning in particular indicates a definite and decisive act of ending the long winter of decay, coldness and desolation (implying and symbolising death). Now everything has become young and fresh, except, that is, the author’s age. The contrast cannot be starker. And yet the author cannot help searching for his lost youth, knowing that it would fail and only be futile.

Yes, the author is “telling” that the search effort is futile. There is no room for the reader to think any other way. Yes, the author is “telling” that his youth is now lost. This, however, does not make the poem any less. It is all, in fact, beside the point. The central theme of this haiku is the pathos with which we look at the question of getting old and what it means to us and to the people around us in our long and bumpy journey of life. The poignancy, resignation, sorrow, loneliness, weakening physical and mental capacity, illnesses, etc., are all there without us “telling” them. The power of this haiku comes from the strength of the author’s feelings, which required the inclusion of such words as “futile” (implying he has tried more than once but never succeeded), and “lost” (the author admits that it is gone and there seems no more struggle). On the contrary these what the minimalist may call “redundant”, or “surplus” words are actually vital “key words” without which this haiku would become a vague, anodyne, mediocre and less interesting observation. In this haiku, “spring cleaning” is a strong kigo and would need strong second and third lines, the contrast between the two being generating a tension which is also preventing the haiku from becoming just like thousands of any other.