onion

http://www.facebook.com/haikucrossroads/posts/343929305619647

A ku in a ku.

I much prefer the open option. The abstract reading is superb. A passing wind. There's a lot of directional space in that.

Then, one can read the shallow, innuendo, version. [Rather than get stuck there and not proceed to the onion's core; the pure experience of the ku's imagery, in and of itself.]

You see, . . .

Language use, in daily life, has the literal and the implied. Always this (reversal is also argued). However (and this is the great haiku hurdle for Westerners in particular), there are more universal implications to all things, in this case a ku.

And so we head for the archetype.

But, we stop when we get to the heart of the ku (which is halfway to the archetypal source).

Why?

Because a ku's manifest is not a magic spell. To proceed beyond the objective remit of a ku is to enter the boundless (thus, engaging the mystic journey).

SO, WE HANG AT THE KU'S HEART'S CORE; THE IMPLICIT IMAGE (NOT WHAT IT MAY, OR MAY NOT IMPLY).

Then we have a neutral centre:

old pond

a frog jumps in

the sound of water

Now. . . .

This centre is enveloped by boundless mystery. That is, in Nippon aesthetics: 'yugan' (a word derived from the dye which is the colour of twilight, a deep indigo-violet; hence the word's symbolic origin, connoting deep mystery of numinous being and its astonishing and, apparently profligate, phenomenal 'fruiting bodies').

And so...when we contemplate a ku the ideas and visions that come, come from the shallower levels (on the way in/out) and the mysterious boundlessness' of yugan.

If we choose to leave the ku's centre and travel into infinity, then we engage in a mystic journey. (The ku's original purpose is morphed into a magic traveling spell.)

Conversely, If we choose to approach the shallows, or not proceed to the ku's centre, then we are engaging in socio-psychological analysis.

THE LATTER HABIT IS THE GREAT ERROR OF WESTERN (AND WESTERNIZED) MENTATION.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westernization

NOTE

I've diatribed my response to lay down a sketch of what really needs to be written up thoughtfully (with clear diagrams). For the time being, though, we can picture a sphere or vast circular plain, perhaps (provisionally), and let our higher intuition fill in the gaps. . . .

***Certainly one step in is simply innuendo and, clearly, a proper ku is much, much more than this.