Art by Watanabe Shotei (Wikipedia).
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Hi! My name is Laura Gibbs, and this website is for sharing the various Haiku Games that I've created. Some of these are solitaire games, while others are games you can play with others, either in person or online with Zoom. Short URL: Haiku.LauraGibbs.net
What makes a haiku game?
These are not competitive games. Instead, they are games of serendipity, chance encounters to help you deepen your knowledge of haiku. The multiplayer games are also about sharing haiku with others.
I have created THREE different types of games, and each type of game can be played as a solitaire game or as a multiplayer game, in person or by Zoom:
Haiku Basics. This is a game for people who are new or new-ish to haiku and would like to learn more about the features of haiku poetry — but you can also play using a more advanced version of the features game too; it doesn't have to be just for beginners.
Haiku Encounters. This is a haiku-only game, inspired by the spirit of linked poetry and the way that haiku poems can mutually illuminate one another.
Deep-Dive Haiku. This is a game to help you deepen your knowledge of haiku by engaging with haiku scholars and haiku poets, thinking about their approaches to the craft of haiku poetry and its long history, both in Japan and now around the world.
HOW TO GET STARTED. You can play the games with the materials that are already collected here at this website; everything is ready to go! Here are the materials you will find here at the site:
POEM CARDS, with haiku collected from these sources:
English-language poems from the online LIving Haiku Anthology ; I'm using only the poems that are Creative-Commons-licensed
poems in English and Japanese from Clay and Yumi Boutwell's Learn Japanese Through Haiku books, used by the very generous permission of the authors
translations from the Japanese by Adjei Agyei-Baah and Gabriel Rosenstock as published in The Awakened One and free to reuse with acknowledgment
QUOTE CARDS with quotes-about-haiku (and some quotes about Zen too) from the books on my own personal bookshelves.
FEATURE CARDS about different aspects of haiku poetry (with an emphasis on Japanese aesthetics and Zen because those are my own personal interests).
If you're curious, you can see random cards on this page: a random haiku poem, a random haiku feature, and a random haiku quote. Each time you reload the page, new poems, features, and quotes appear at random. And random serendipity is exactly what makes it possible to play some fun games with these materials!
MAKE IT YOUR OWN. To make these games even better, you can make them your own!
DIY Haiku Cards. For example, instead of playing with haiku from the Living Haiku Anthology, you can make your own poetry cards, collecting haiku from your favorite books and journals etc., or using haiku that you have written yourself! More about making your own haiku cards.
DIY Quote Cards. You can also include quotes from books about haiku, but also from any book about the craft of poetry or writing; quotes from meditation books, or from books about Buddhism, books about the natural world... so many possibilities! More about making your own quote cards.
~ Cards Cards Cards ~
~ Cards Cards Cards ~
If you are making cards just to play with once or twice, you can simply cut up pieces of notebook paper: that works fine! But if you are interested in playing with your cards again and again, you'll want to get index cards. You might even be like me and buy your index cards in bulk! You can find lots of inexpensive index card parks at Amazon; I am a steady consumer of both white 3x5 cards (1 cent each!) and colored 3x5 cards (2 cents each!). I'm also a believer in hole-punches and metal rings for keeping my cards in packs — I can't use rubber bands because my cats will try to eat them :-).
These are my cards playing Deep Dive solitaire: poem cards and quote cards.
Yes, I really am learning Japanese through haiku! Find out more: Books for Learning Japanese Through Haiku.
This project was made possible by Sam Illingworth, who taught the game workshop where these games began; you can find out more about Sam's work at his website: SamIllingworth.com — and also by Randy Hoyt, who built the randomizer tool that I use for all these games; you can find out more about Randy's work at his website: RandyHoyt.com. Thank you so much, Sam and Randy!
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