Rules of Form

Rules of Form and Freedom of Spirit in Haiku

The Keynote Speech for WHF2000, London-Oxford Conference

Ian Codrescu

Romania

Why does haiku draw the ever-growing attention of the Western reader who is familiar with other types of poetical discourse? The tradition of Japanese poetry is quite different from the European one. The figures of speech commonly used in European poetry are practically non-existent in haiku.

Loneliness –

Sinking into the rocks,

A cicada’s cry. Basho

Hidden behind the simplicity and strictness of haiku is an entire aesthetics of expression that avoids repetition, aphorism and abstraction. He who reads haiku for the first time, knowing nothing about its poetics, could be disappointed or indifferent to those few words that make up the structure of a poem.

the potato thieves

exclaim in low voices

at the falling star

Dee Evetts

How could we call a “breath of words” poetry when it avoids using metaphor and simile, as well as withholding the author’s interpretation?

deep in the woods

this one raindrop still

on a pine needle

George Ralph

Despite all these things, haiku is poetry. Léopold Sédar Senghor (a contemporary African poet from Senegal) called it “the most beautiful poem in the world”. < To suggest a landscape, a picture or a moment – to juxtapose two or three images in a few words, means to master a writing technique that is hard to acquire. Roland Barthes writes in The Empire of Signs, that “haiku seems to give to the West something that its own literature does not provide” -- because this poem does not describe, does not interpret an impression or certain state of mind or emotion; rather, it presents it directly, as it is “here and now”, avoiding the abstractions, the metaphors, the similes and the epithets. Poetry must be beyond the poem. When someone thinks that poetry is found only in library books, or that we can feel the poetry by taking a book from the shelf or reciting verses and stressing their rhythms and rhymes, he is making a mistake. To discover poetry in the ordinary moments, to believe that everything has the right to become poetic, to express that special feeling of illumination called by Westerners, “the haiku moment”, only in a few words --this is the greatest thing a haijin can experience.

house for sale –

the apricot tree in bloom

as never before

Ian Codrescu

Although haiku is perhaps the shortest poem in world literature, with such a simple form which gives one the impression that anyone can write it – and which, on first reading, leaves many people disappointed because they do not find the familiar elements of Western poetry – the reality is quite different. Behind this simplicity, there is an aesthetic principle that can only be noticed by those who believe that poetry is something other than what anthropocentric Europe has taught us; in other words, that man is the centre of the universe. Here are the words of Santoka about his own poems:

“Who says my poems are poems?

My poems are not poems.

After you know that my poems are not poems,

Then we can begin to discuss poetry”.

Paraphrasing him, we can say that only after we forget what we have learned about poetry in school will we be able to consider haiku real poetry -- only then will we be able to understand and appreciate it -- only then will we be able to enjoy its unique spirit. In this Hollywood-like world, full of slogans and advertisements, which violates not only our eyes and ears but also the harmless landscape, haiku is an invitation to rediscover a way to communicate with nature. In haiku, the poetic discourse is not as long as classical and modern European poetry, but on the contrary, reveals only the moment that illuminates us. The reader’s attention is directed toward common things, toward details that seem familiar to us, but in reality are not.

when the spade turns

the earth in our garden –

how different it is!

Ion Codrescu

If we look carefully around ourselves, perhaps we will notice other things also. A dewdrop crossed by a sunbeam, a distant sound, a certain movement of an insect, or even the bark of a tree deserves our attention as much as the “events” presented so stridently by the mass-media.

birch bark –

columns of ants

crossing the stripes

Ion Codescru

In this paper I would like to present two elements that, in the writing of haiku, interest me very much: its form and spirit. When I read haiku for the first time -- this happened in 1974 -- I was captivated by its miniature form and fascinated by its unique spirit. I can say that its spirit still fascinates and excites me, that it allows me to discover its most hidden meanings that cannot be understood without the experience of writing haiku. To read and write haiku becomes a spiritual exercise. Garry Gay, a haiku friend from California, says, “the discipline of becoming aware is called haiku”. I am often asked why I write haiku. I asked myself such a question many years ago, when I began to write haiku. I wanted to know if I had the right to compose this Japanese poem. Even after twenty-five years of practising haiku, I still do not know the true answer.

Haiku and its spirit belong to the larger genre of Imagist poetry. The technique of “catching” an image in a poem is similar to the art of a photographer who registers things and records the gift nature has provided in that single moment, without drawing any kind of conclusions. In its classic period, Japanese haiku was written in 5-7-5 pattern, and it had to follow many strict rules: to mirror nature, to concentrate upon a “snapshot” or the characteristic feature of an event, to be a dialogue between the ephemeral (ryuko) and the eternal (fueki) and so on. If we look carefully at the pattern of the poems written in the classic period, we can find numerous haiku composed in different number of syllables (onji). Here are two examples. The first has 8-7-5 and the second, 10-7-5:

basho no wake shite

tarai ni ame o

kiku yo kana Bashô

ro no koe nami o utte

harawate koru

yo ya namida

Bashô

Nowadays, even some Japanese poets have given up the rigid form, and focus their attention on the spirit of this poem. Here is a Japanese haiku by Ozaki Hosai that does not respect the traditional form of 5-7-5 onji:

Musicality in Haiku Written in Spanish: a Platonism?

Carlos Fleitas

Uruguay, South America

"Give an illustration," I said. She answered me as follows: "There is poetry, which, as you know, is complex; and manifold. All creation or passage of non-being into being is poetry or making, and the processes of all art are creative; and the masters of Arts are all poets or makers." "Very true." "Still," she said, "you know that they are not called poets, but have other names; only that portion of the art which is separated off from the rest, and is concerned with music and meter, is termed poetry, and they who possess poetry in this sense of the word are called poets." (1)

Rhythm in Music and Rhythm in Poetry

I would like to make a personal confession. I have forgiven Plato. Truly. Because although he finally expels poets from his ideal Republic as false pedagogues, he puts in the mouth of Diotima, the above definitions. In short, poetry is "the passage of non-being into being...and is concerned with music and meter." At this point, one has two options: Leave these envisioned thoughts to work by themselves in our minds without further comment, or add a few unnecessary footnotes with the hope they will soon return to the non-being. I will choose the latter because I have given my word to a lady that I would write this small paper. Not keeping it is the kind of sin the gods would never forgive.

What is the relation between music and poetry? The main fact is that music and speech have an intimate relation, as Dr. Richard Hooker asserts: "all music is based on two fundamental human activities: speech and movement. Speech is the basis of music in its rhythms, tones, and cadences; music, in part, is an exaggeration of basic tonal and rhythmical qualities of human speech." (2) According to this idea, speech bears musical qualities by itself and it is the origin of music. Music seems to have evolved from these qualities, and to have become somehow independent, as instrumental music, inheriting the main issues of speech mentioned above.

Rhythm then, is the common denominator of music and poetry. In music, rhythm can be defined as "not only the fluency, the movable, but also the measure of movement, the limitation of fluency. It rests on the differentiation of values of duration shorter or longer, stressed and non-stressed, and weak or strong. "(3) "Meter in music is: a) the rhythmic element as measured by division into parts of equal time value. b) the unit of measurement, in terms of number of beats, adopted for a given piece of music." (17)

Rhythm in poetry is given by recurrence of patterns; i.e. it is the reiteration at regular intervals of some elements, (8) which are obviously related to the rhythmic natural characteristics of the language in which it is written. Spanish is a language of syllabic rhythm, characterized by the number of syllables in a poetic line, instead of the number and qualities of the accents, as in English. (7) English is a language of stressed rhythm, that is created by "the recurrence of stress or emphasis within the words and syllables of the poetic line" (4) and the rhythm in a line is measured by the meter. Some meters are of a definite length; others are variable. (5) And meter in English poetry is the pattern of a poem's rhythm/stresses; the unit of measure is called a foot. (4) Spanish poetry (this is particularly true in traditional poetry) is written to have a specific number of syllables per line. Although the rhythm of Spanish poetry depends, in a minor way, on stresses, it is not so remarkable as in English poetry, which is written to have a specific number of primary accents in each line in spite of the number of syllables. (7)

Musicality in Spanish Poetry

Rhythm and Musicality. Resources to establish musicality and rhythm in Spanish Poetry; The 20^th Century Revolution in Music and Poetry.

Strictly speaking then, the main factor that brings musicality to a poetry line is rhythm. And rhythm in poetry is closely related to the rules of prosody that encompass not only rhythm, but also meter and the melodic structure of the poem. So, it is very important to keep in mind that rhythm is fully appreciated when the poem is read out loud. This is due to the fact that poetry, in its origin, was composed to be heard, not read. That is, to be spoken out loud, or also sung. It is also important to keep in mind that when a "verse is pronounced, accents occur at certain regular intervals; they, too determine the rhythm of the poem." (15). Other resources, as soon we will see, bring a musical secondary effect to poetic lines in some languages. In Western poetry, the degree of musicality can be augmented by their use, apart from the maintenance of a rhythmic pattern -- which is the essence of poetry and the one that differentiates it (if it encompasses at least a certain meter) from other literary genres such as prose. There are three main resources that have a musical effect when applied to a poetic line, or to lines in Spanish: alliteration, assonance and rhyme. I would like to emphasize the fact that they produce a musical effect, but strictly speaking, they are not a musical issue in the same way as is rhythm alone. However, in Spanish language, if properly used, they can meaningfully contribute to the rhythm of a poem because of the repetitive pattern they can create. A musical effect is possible, in that the result of applying them to poetic lines brings euphonic sound(s) to the listener.

Let me give some examples:

a) The second stanza of the XVII sonnet by Garcilaso de la Vega

El ancho campo me parece estrecho,

la noche clara para mí es escura;

la dulce compañía, amarga y dura,

y duro campo de batalla el lecho.

This sonnet, like the majority of sonnets in Spanish language, has its rhythm based in syllable count (11), natural pauses, rhyme, assonance

and certain alliteration. Assonance, rhyme and alliteration give euphonic sonority to the poem.

b) Federico García Lorca's Romancero Sonámbulo is written without a strict syllable number per line as in the sonnet, but the use of assonance, i.e. open vowels, gives an extraordinary musicality to the poem. However, the use of assonance in this case is intimately related with the meaning of the poem, or better, with a contrast of atmospheres such as life and death which Lorca displays in this jewel of lyricism and depth.

Verde que te quiero verde,

Verde viento. Verdes ramas.

El barco sobre la mar

y el caballo en la montaña

Con la sombra en su cintura

ella sueña en su baranda,

verde carne, pelo verde

Con ojos de fria plata...

This may seem at first strange, but if we think of words also as sounds, then we can be aware that poetry is also an organization of sounds -- sonority, as in music. This issue usually stays in the background because we are more interested in the meaning of words than in the musicality of them. But musicality is always there, and we realize it as soon as an unpleasant sonority, lack of fluency or rhythm breaks in a poem line becomes clearly noticeable. As a matter of fact, throughout history there has been a major contention between those who support and those who condemn the use of music and musicality in text and poetry, not only in the West, but in the East also. One particular case concerns religious music.

To summarize: Rhythm is part of the structure of music and poetry. It is always present, at least until the major changes that would affect the traditional meaning of rhythm in the 20th century in the West, both in music and in poetry. Alliteration, assonance and rhyme are mainly sonority resources which bring musical effects to the verses or poetic lines, creating euphony, although in Spanish language, they can also contribute to the rhythm of the poem. Therefore, they deal with the sounds, not with the meaning, although, as we will see, they can, if used properly, add or reinforce a previous meaning which is present in the poem, or in an extreme case, eclipse meaning. In "non traditional verse," "non-metrical poetry" or "free verse," they can be main resources to create a reiterated pattern -- that is, a rhythm not based on the number of syllables or on a particular meter. But in free-verse, in absence of assonance or alliteration, the rhythm must still be kept by the cadence. We must also mention the "blank verses" that have no rhythm but which keep to a metrical pattern.

In Western music, the scales and laws of euphony condition sounds and their combination: That is, pleasant or unpleasant sounds. The predominant Western scale of music, until last century, is called diatonic scale, and the rules and laws of composition were set on the XVII century. Therefore, the euphonic of sounds is conditioned to a particular scale along with its criterion of pleasant sounds or combination of sounds. This is why when the criterion changes, some people may find new sonorities quite annoying to the ear. Because poetry also is conditioned to the sonority of the language in which it has been written, what is euphonic to a certain culture may be dissonant to the ears of people from another. It may well become a matter of contention between generations in the same culture. Elders, many times judge the new generation's music, as "unpleasant noises". Spanish listeners find the German sounds non-euphonic and quite harsh. This is because the phonemic roots of German are non-Romanic, and therefore their sonority is rather unfamiliar to Spanish people who have a Romanic origin of language-root phonemes. This makes Bach's Cantatas, to non-trained Spanish listeners, have a non-euphonic sound in its choruses.

Other features which contribute to rhythm (therefore degrees of musicality) apart from the use of the number of syllables, rhyme, and distribution of accents in Spanish poetry include:

a) The use of pauses, the most important pause being that which is produced at the end of each verse. This is especially true whenever the pause coincides with the natural pauses of the language as we speak, or when we have completed an idea, or a syntactic structure (see Garcilaso's sonnet and next example). If we end the line with a noun and start the next line with an adjective, we break the natural end of the idea and the natural pause.

b) The anaphora or the repetition of one or more words at the beginning of each verse:

Esta luz, éste fuego que me devora.

Este paisaje gris que me rodea.

Este dolor por una sola idea.

Esta angustia de cielo, mundo y hora.

Federico García Lorca. (9)

c) The use of parallelism: that is the repetition of a syntactic structure:

Suspiros tristes, lagrimas cansadas

(Noun+adjective, noun+adjective)

Que lanza el corazón, los ojos llueven,

Los troncos bañan y las ramas mueven

(art. +noun+adj, art.+noun+adj)

Luis de Góngora (9)

d) The use of refrain: repetition of words in the poetic line or in different verses of the same poem.

Paso un día y otro día,

Un mes y otro mes,

Un año y otro año.

(Anonymous)

Puente de mi soledad

por los ojos de mi muerte

tus aguas van hacia el mar,

al mar del que no se vuelve.

(Emilio Prados) (9)

e) Finally the use of rhyme, that is: the repetition of sounds from the last stressed vowel in each verse, can contribute to rhythm and musicality of a poem. The rhyme may be, in Spanish, assonant or consonant, being the last one -- the one that is used in the sonnet as a rule.

As we have stated, these resources which create rhythm in poetry changed radically in the 20^th Century in the West. The free verse or vers libre, born in France by the end of the 19th Century, originated a completely new way of poetic creation: "Free verse has no regular metrical scheme. Its rhythms derive from the sounds, words, phrases, and stanzas. Some free verse is so like casual speech that it is difficult to recognize as poetry." (5) In English poetry, the works of Carl Sandburg, William Carlos Williams, Marianne Moore and Wallace Stevens are well known. Before them, Walt Whitman stands as a major representative of free verse. In Spanish language, we can mention the poetics of Ruben Darío, Leon Felipe, Cesar Vallejo, Nicanor Parra, Jorge Luis Borges among many, many other great poets who use free verse. Although the traditional rules of creating rhythm devices fell away, rhythm continued to be a main issue, but now built with different features, as it is mentioned above.

Music was subjected to a "revolution" in the last century. Rules of composition which were applied for almost four centuries were tossed away, if I may say so. Igor Stravinsky, Arnold Schonberg and his disciples Alban Berg and Anton Von Webern opened the gates for new rules and new sonorities in music. Changes came very quickly. Soon new movements grew and developed, also affecting vocal music. Rhythm suffered so many changes that it turned out to be, in effect, non-recognizable. For example, the rhythm in Stravinsky is focused on the sudden change of meter or on unusual meters. Free verse and free music also, were a total revolution in the notion of rhythm. New ways of composing poetry were in open contrast with the traditional rules. (3)

Musicality in Japanese Haiku

Does Japanese haiku have musicality? Is introducing musicality to haiku written in Spanish a sort of heresy, or an artificial device, strange to the so called "spirit of haiku"? The answer to this most important question will bring light to us when we face the subject of musicality of haiku written in Spanish. Let me start with some considerations on the structure and characteristics of Japanese language in relation to haiku: "The sounds in Japanese are simpler and less varied than those in English. They also have much less accent, stress and intonation, giving a somewhat monotonous, soft and flat impression. There are only five vowels, and in theory consonants are always followed by a vowel. Certain English sounds are absent in Japanese, such as v, f, di as in dim. Other English sounds, most notably r and l, are bundled together in a single sound. The rest of the fifty plus one sounds, which form all Japanese sounds, are created by adding these five vowels to consonants, k, s, t, n, h, m, y, r/l, w. The last sound is a soft, nasal version of n." (12)

"Japanese has an open-syllable sound pattern, in that most syllables end in a vowel -- the syllable may be composed solely of the vowel. Unlike English, which has stress accent, Japanese has pitch accent, which means that after an accented syllable, the pitch falls." (10) These characteristics make rhyme structure and metric system not so prominent. Therefore, its principal resource is the syllabic measurement. Syllables count primarily in Japanese poems as the main rhythm resource. (11)

Rhythm: "The main source of haiku rhythm is the 5 - 7- 5 syllable format It can be grouped in one or other of two ways, i.e. either 5 + 12, or 12 + 5, but even then there is a notional pause between 7 and 5, or 5 and 7 within the 12 syllables" (Takiguchi) (12).

David Lanoue has the same point of view: "As for rhythm, the Japanese haiku, of course, has a built-in rhythm of 5-7-5 syllables (or, as Robin Gill calls them, "syllabets"). There are two basic patterns to this structure: long-short and short-long.

.....Long-short (12 + 5 syllabets):

te no shiwa no hito ya ni miyuru / aki no ame

the night spent looking

at my wrinkled hands...

autumn rain

Issa

.....Short-long (5 + 12 syllabets):

meigetsu ya / yoko ni neru hito ogamu hito

harvest moon--

next to the sleeping man

a praying man

Issa (13)

Lanoue also drives the attention to the fact that: "Issa likes to produce internal rhythm with word repetition":

kyô mo kyô mo tako hikkakaru enoki kana

today too, today too

the nettle tree snags

the kite

Issa

Here's one that R. H. Blyth liked the sound of:

gege mo gege gege no gegoku no suzushisa yo

it's a down, down

downtrodden land

but cool

Issa "(13)

According to Blyth, states Lanoue, "the repetition of ge (which means down as in downtrodden) sounds like hammering nails in the coffin of Issa's poverty. But the wonderful shift to suzushisa yo, in the end, hints of emotional release: poverty gives way to the freedom of nature: the wonderful cool air. Issa also likes to useonomatopoeic double-words that are quite common in Japanese, such as fuwa-fuwa (softly, softly):

daibutsu ya hana yori kiri wa fuwa-fuwa to

from the great bronze

Buddha's nose mist...

softly, softly

Issa (13)"

"There are hundreds of examples like the above in Issa's work", states Lanoue (13)

Rhyme: As we have seen above, the structure of Japanese language make rhyme in haiku meaningless. As Susumu Takiguchi has stated: "Rhyming in haiku is neither as prominent nor as important as in English poems. Its abuse could even make a haiku gimmicky and artificial, but used well, it can help create a sophisticated and dramatic haiku. Its position is not restricted to the ends, but frequently found within the lines. In this sense, haiku rhyme is more like refrain, explained in the next section, and perhaps should not be called rhyme at all, in the sense used in English or Chinese poems." (12) This is one of the many examples Takiguchi puts in his lesson:

Yama mata yama yamazakura mata yamazakura

Mountain after mountain

mountain cherry trees

after mountain cherry trees

Awano Seiho (12)

Concerning its use within the lines, David Lanoue has found in Issa's haiku quite a number of internal rhymes: As for rhyme, he states: "Issa uses internal rhyme within a phrase; hardly ever end rhyme." For example:

hito areba hae ari hotoke ari ni keri

where there's people

there's flies

and Buddhas

Issa

Lanoue has located 26 examples of the above pattern (-ri ni keri) in his Issa's archive in his website." (13)

Alliteration and Assonace

"First, let me comment on alliteration and assonance," continues Lanoue. "These are VERY prevalent in the work of Issa. Here's one of my favorites:

yû zuki ya nabe no naka nite naku tanishi

night moon--

pond snails crying

in the kettle

Issa

Note the wonderful sound-play of "nabe no naka nite"! Usually the alliteration and assonance are more subtle.

naki nagara mushi no nagaruru ukigi kana

still singing

the insect drifts away...

floating branch

Issa

Note how the "n" "a" "i" and "u" repeat musically, creating an interlocking pattern. Alliteration and assonance are ubiquitous in Issa." (13)

Refrain

The use of refrain is a well known device to create a repetitive pattern that brings rhythm and therefore, musicality to the poem. The following are examples that Takiguchi brings in his WHC lesson #3.

Yuki naran sayo no Nakayama yoru naran

It must be snowing

at Sayo no Nakayama,

it must be night.

Hekigodo

Uragaeshi mata uragaeshi taiga haku

Sweeping a big moth,

it turns one side up and then

the other side up.

Maeda Fura (12)

To summarize: In Japanese haiku, we can find musicality as a result of the proper use of certain resources, such as internal rhyme, alliteration, assonance and refrain. Its rhythm is given by syllable measurementmainly, with two basic patterns: long-short (12-5) and short-long (5-12). In the opinion of David Lanoue, "it is interesting that the Japanese words for poem, uta, and for reciting a poem utau, signify: song and to sing. Semantically, therefore, a poem is a song in Japanese." (13)

This semantic equivalence corresponds to a fact: that poetry in its origin is a song -- in all cultures. In ancient Greece, poetry was often performed, accompanied by the lyre. The term, lyrical poetry, specifically retains the common denominator of poetry and music. Before haiku became independent from haikai-no-renga, due to the mastery of Basho, there was a long tradition of chanting in the Japanese Court and also of folk songs. "Before songs were written, the syllabic pattern was 4 - 6 (or more) patterns. Once they were written and recited in front of other people in the court, simply recited by heart -- or in other words, once they began to form poems, it seems that the 5 - 7 syllabic pattern became dominant. Perhaps none can explain exactly why. It could be that this 5 - 7 syllable pattern became such because of Japanese language's linguistic structure." (20) Again, Lanoue agrees that "even the length of poetic lines may have a close historical relation with both court and folk song". (13)

Finally, concerning the skills of Japanese high school students of English, a study made by Mr. Brett Reynolds, Professor of English in Sakuragaoka Girls Jr. & Sr. High School, Tokyo, Japan, shows that "it takes very little instruction to get students to notice rhyming and alliteration. With Japanese students, I have found this even easier than identifying English syllables." (14) Our first impression is that Japanese people have a natural and highly developed musical insight that enables them to a quick recognition of musical devices in the English language; that is, they are used to musicality in their native language. This research has not being made with Spanish texts, as far as I know, but I believe, just as a hypothesis that the results would be similar. To summarize, Japanese language has, as all languages do, a great potential of musicality in its structure.

Musicality in Haiku Written in Spanish

As we have seen, the Spanish language has a great number of resources by which musicality may be brought to poetry. These resources can also be explored and applied to haiku since they do not break the traditional patterns or essence of Japanese haiku. The first condition is to use them in a quiet and natural manner; that is, keeping the balance between musicality and meaning. If musicality prevails and becomes the goal of a haiku, then it would bring sophistication and artificiality to it, and the meaning would be lost. If no degree of musicality appears, the poem may lose its euphonic essence, or the natural cadence of speech; i.e. it would be only written to transmit an idea. This would make a verse like any other written text, but not poetry. Furthermore, if we consider that a minimum of rhythm is necessary to build a poem, and that rhythm is a first degree of musicality, then it would lose one of its main points. This is relevant when we have to examine the 5-7-5 pattern in haiku written in Spanish.

Rhythm: In Spanish, due to its syllabic rhythmic structure, the 5-7-5 format fits, in that there is a poetic form called seguidilla which has the same syllabic pattern as that of haiku. The main difference is that it is a stanza of four verses and seven verses, and it always keeps an assonant rhyme. The four verses called seguidilla simple have the following pattern: 7-5a'-7-5a' with assonant rhyme in a'. The seven verses called seguidilla compuesta has a 7-5a'-7-5a'-5b'-7-5b' with assonant rhyme in a' and b'. It is easy to see that the three last verses of each are 5-7-5 syllables. So, the 5-7-5 haiku syllable format is not an unknown structure in Spanish poetry, and haiku written in this language can perfectly follow this rule. Let us see some examples of seguidillas:

seguidilla simple

Un pajarito alegre 7.-

picó tu boca 5 a'

creyendo que tus labios 7.-

eran dos rosas. 5 a'

(anónimo-popular)

seguidilla compuesta

Una fiesta se hace 7.-

con tres personas: 5 a'

una baila, otra canta, 7.-

y la otra toca. 5 a'

Ya me olvidaba 5 b'

de los que dicen "¡ole!" 7.-

y tocan palmas. 5 b'

(Manuel Machado) (16)

Thus, the 5-7-5 syllable pattern may be kept in Spanish as a rhythmic resource, in that there is a traditional stanza poetic form and genre that makes use of it, as well as the long tradition of meter in Spanish poetry. At the same time, I must say that according to the haiku written by Ibero-American poets which I have read, the 5-7-5 syllable pattern is not kept by the majority. Why is this so? While I have no definite opinion, I do think that in the actual practice, perhaps a free meter haiku is found by these poets to be more suitable than the 5-7-5 pattern. The 5-7-5 format may, if kept rigorously, somehow force the haiku, i.e. using words, somehow artificially, to keep the pattern. Yet it could be seen as a lack of exercising haiku writing in 5-7-5 until it becomes a more familiar form. We must also be aware that in the West, the metrical form of poetry is more an exception than an everyday habit. In the last century, when meter, as a requirement for writing poetry, was broken, free verse became the writing technique which almost every poet adopted. Nowadays, when Western poets write haiku, the paradigm is the one of free verse, not the one of traditional meter. Anyway, the subject is currently open to debate and exploration.

Rhyme

The use of rhyme is one of the major ways of bringing musicality to a haiku. The two standards are consonantand assonant rhyme. Consonant rhyme in Spanish happens when the last accented vowel of the verse, and all vowels and consonants that may follow it, are the same in all the rhymed words.(15)

La playa sola

mecidas por las olas

las caracolas...

This fine haiku, written by Malena Imas (Uruguay, South America) is a clear example of consonant rhyme. The musicality here is brought, not only by means of the use of the consonance, but also as its rhyme merges with the content of the haiku; that is, the waves of the sea with its natural rhythm, and the landscape of a seashore in which the conches are gently rocked, as if it where a lullaby...

Internal rhyme (rima interior): the use of a word in the interior of a verse that rhymes with an other word of the verse.

en este camino

solo el monótono trino

del teru-teru

Carlos Fleitas

Assonance and Alliteration

The use of assonance and alliteration can be noticed in the following haiku:

luna lunera

con su copla plañidera

el gitano te espera

Carlos Fleitas

The first line uses a musical device resembling an Andalucía's and Lorca's poetical mood. It stresses the melody of the haiku from the beginning with a reiteration that is not an adjective by itself, but which plays the part of it. The haiku also has a consonant rhyme.

alba de abril

al abrir sus petalos

despierta la rosa

Carlos Fleitas

In this example the assonance is based mainly, in the sound of an open vowel:

en la glorieta

ramos de rosas rojas

rodean enamorados

Carlos Fleitas

The assonance is quite clear in the above poem, especially in the second line.

Refrain

En noches frías,

en frías noches de invierno

tu compañía.

This fine haiku by Luis Corrales (Sevilla, España) uses refrain to create a repetitive rhythmic pattern. Also the reiteration of noches frias, frias noches reinforces the meaning, stressing not only the coldness of the night but also the warmness of company. In this way the opposition between loneliness = coldness and company = warmness is clearly noticeable.

Pauses

The use of pauses in haiku, when they coincide with natural speech pauses -- or give closure to an idea, can be a rhythmic resource. Pauses can be placed keeping the 5-7-5 or 12-5 or 5-12 formats depending on the particular haiku. If they coincide with those mentioned above when using the latter formats, the haiku will be fluent and natural.

Free-line haiku

In free-line haiku, the musicality lies in cadence.

Juan José Tablada or Euterpe goes to Mexico

If Juan José Tablada had written a manifest setting the principles of his haiku Ars Poetica, certainly he would have paraphrased Shakespeare's Henry V, thus saying: "Once more unto the lyre, dear friends, once more;" a fair paraphrase, because Tablada uses an extraordinary range of musical resources in his haiku. While he lived in Japan for ten months during the year, 1910, he wrote a poem which is a manifest of his passionate love for Japan and its culture (19). He wrote a book about Hiroshigue, and as O.Paz states, he was the first Spanish poet to write haiku in Ibero-America. Paz also tells us that Tablada called his haiku, haikai, and that he was right calling them so, because his poems are not linked as in haikai-no-renga. Rather, they are independent one from another, as haiku. Still, the content of his haiku-haikai is similar to those of traditional haikai-no-renga -- a "witty mood, irony and love for brilliant images." (18) Although Tablada does not keep the 5-7-5 meter, he seems not to mind doing so. Paz presents an exception in the following haiku:

Trozos de barro

Por la senda en penumbra

Saltan los sapos. (18)

Paz calls this haiku "a perfect matching between meter and real poetry" (18). It is noticeable that, in the last line, alliteration is used by Tablada with a minimum of assonance in the open sound of the vowel, a. The use of open vowel sounds is somewhat a constant in a great number of his haiku. Sometimes he gives the impression of being deeply interested, not only in the meaning of words, but also in phonemes. Musicality, to him, is of great importance for meaning and he employs it with an incredible mastery due to the fact that it adds sparks and brilliancy to the witty contents of his haiku.

Recorriendo su tela

Esta luna clarísima

Tiene a la araña en vela. (19)

This haiku is full of serene humor. The use of rhyme and assonance is clearly noticeable. Tablada does not keep the 5-7-5 format. Instead, he builds perfect rhythm by using natural pauses of speech. The three moments of the haiku, as marked by the pauses, are perfectly linked, and a natural, spontaneous fluency takes command of the poem. Musicality and meaning join in perfect matrimony here.

Tierno saúz:

casi oro, casi ambar,

casi luz. (18)

In this wonderful haiku, Tablada uses the word casi to make repetitive sound, creating a musical rhythmic effect. The example could also be included as a one which uses the anaphora, mentioned earlier. The musicality issues from the repetition of phonemes for sonority in the word casi. For reinforcement, he creates consonance with saúz and luz, so that the haiku has a perfect resolution.

Tablada had a great affection for visual arts. He gathered more than a thousand Japanese prints. This passion is somehow reflected in his haiku; the images are lively, full of sensual impressions, they even seem to have a texture. Sensibility yes, but also full of sensations.

Tablada worked as a journalist and was "devoured by journalism," as O. Paz states. (18). He died in 1945, and his work had an immense influence in the new generations of poets. His legacy, as Paz tell us, is to set in his haiku, a principle that poets sometimes forget: "the correspondence between what words say, and what the eyes see" (18). Being so, his work is one of the highest peaks in written Spanish poetry, enough to refresh once and again the path of haiku …

References:

(1) SYMPOSIUM by Plato translated by Benjamin Jowett.

Plato developed a high esteem for poets because in the Lysis he states: "and see what the poets have to say; for they are to us in a manner the fathers and authors of wisdom…" But finally in his last opus "The Republic" he expels them from his ideal polis.

Lysis, by Plato translated by Benjamin Jowett:

(2) Dr. Richard Hooker: Ancient Japan; The Earliest Japanese Music.

(3) Translation from Musica by Rudolf Stephan, Compañía General Fabril Editora Buenos Aires 1964.

(4) Terms for Literary Study

(5) Encyclopedia Brittanica: Poetry

(6) Translation from Analysis Poético 1 : "The term poetry generally describes written texts that follow a rhyme, a rhythm or a meter in reiterated patterns that relate words by its sound as well as by its meaning. And they are many rhyme and meter formats"

(7) Translation from El Ritmo

(8) Translation from: Como escribir un soneto

(9) Translation from: Rima y estrofas

(10) Japanese Language

(11) Octavio Paz, Tres momentos de la Literatura Japonesa

(12) Takiguchi Susumu : Japanese Traditional Haiku School Lesson 3, World Haiku Review Volume 1, Issue 1, May 2001

(13) This information was kindly given to me by the well-known scholar, Prof. David Lanoue in reply to questions I asked him concerning this topic. Haiku of Kobayashi Issa (website)

(14) Brett Reynolds, Phonological Awareness in EFL Reading Acquisition, Sakuragaoka Girls Jr. & Sr. High School, Tokyo, Japan

Although not being a scholar in Japanese Literature, Prof Reynolds finds that: “Assonanace does occur in poetry. It generally manifests itself in the repetition of syllables like the ki in the following line: Ki o kiki ni kita. The first ki is the word for tree. O is a grammatical marker which follows the object or patient of the sentence. The third word is the nominalized form of the word kiku, meaning to listen. Finally, kita is the past tense of the verb kuru, to come. Thus, the line means: (I) came to listen to the tree(s)."

(15) Spanish Prosody: A magnificent study of Spanish Prosody

(16) La Poesía

(17) Meter

(18) Octavio Paz, Eikichi Hayashiya: Matsuo Basho. Sendas de Oku.Barral Editores Barcelona 1970 pgs. 18 -26.

(19) To read an excellent selection of his haiku you can go to: Pagina para honrar al gran poeta mexicano Juan Jose Tablada.

La Poetas: A site dedicated to Ibero American poets

(20) Hirano Hideaki, Prof., Hosei University, Tokyo, Japan.