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Call of the Page (Alan & Karen)

Sunday, December 13, 2015

all those red apples | travelling the monorail - haiku travelling in one line - one line haiku aka monostich aka monoku


photo©Alan Summers



all those red apples | travelling the monorail
haiku travelling in one line
by Alan Summers


images©Alan Summers


 So what is it about one line haiku and did you know it's common to see haiku (and hokku) within the Japanese language in just one line?



A lot has been said, and will continue to be said about one line haiku aka the monostich or the monoku.

Here is my piece regarding techniques, devices, and examples.

A longer version appears in a new anthology called Yanty's Butterfly with examples from both established and very new writers in the haiku publishing world:
  

And an article about one line haiku in English will appear in my book “Writing Poetry: the haiku way”.

 Also highly recommended:
  
http://www.albapublishing.com
monoku
One of the many devices I employ is the abrupt method of syntax: It's a deliberate subvert technique, as I’ve keenly noticed that both syntax and semantics can be utilised in a manner not possible or accepted in normal modes of writing, and certainly not in the classic/traditional way of writing haiku in the English language (EL).   

Japanese-language haiku themselves are actually one-line haiku, vertically written, and when read in transliteration rather than translation into English, they do not work in a linear English language manner, but carry their own power outside of attempts to translate them into a translator’s version of smooth English grammar and syntax.

So why not use that power for English Language haiku into one line?

It’s also been said that if it's a one-line haiku you are aiming for, that they work best when they cannot be remade into three line haiku.  I’m not sure that’s always the case, but it’s a useful guideline to go by, or work around.

I'd suggest introducing "abruptions" aka abruptive methods, as one method which is my term for breaking up normal syntax/semantics.


Abruptive techniques is my term for sharp changes in directing the reader, and I often subvert the adjective 'abruptive' into a noun i.e. look for abruptives in your haiku.
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Abruptive: suddenly disruptive
Urban Dictionary
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merriam-webster.com:
abruptive (adjective) : showing a tendency to be abrupt

abruptitude (noun) : the quality of extreme suddenness
Ryan Muller
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 “Sometimes one-line haiku are, or appear to be, a little subversive in order to tell a greater truth. If it's too smooth it could be just a line of poetry, or a statement.” Alan Summers, With Words

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Jim Kacian touches on this:
"Multiple stops yield subtle, rich, often ambiguous texts which generate alternative readings, and subsequent variable meanings.
Each poem can be several poems, and the more the different readings cohere and reinforce each other, the larger the field occupied by the poem, the greater its weight in the mind.”

 Example:

    walking among old stone cattle out in the rain

     Jim Kacian

Extract from The Way of One by Jim Kacian (Roadrunner X-2 -July 2010 ISSN 1933-7337)
Reproduced with permission from Jim Kacian.
*

The one-line haiku in English is perhaps the speedier cousin of the more common poem over three lines, and its velocity - rather than the slow thoughtful pauses in three line haiku -can be one of the major features across the various qualities to one-line haiku. Whether the author wants these monoku read rapidly or a little slower, we touch on just some of those where velocity with quality of language as sound, not just meaning and content, can play its part, and produce from velocity and quality something I will call veloquality.

We can have either multiple interpretations or misreadings and misdirections, as well as thoughtful verses that lead you to places you didn’t know about.

One line haiku can appear in varous guises but always need to contain some aspects of: The gaps between the fragmentary sections of haiku

Does one-line haiku echo the one line image of the fragment/section and phrasal (two line imagery) sections that creates sparks, bringing together an altogether different and extra overall image? Or does it do something different to the technique of juxtaposing imagery?  

Above all it’s the invisible text that counts as much as the visible text, as a catalyst for everything, including the vertical layers of alternative, additional, and complementary meanings from the horizontal surface meaning.  

Haiku is like the Tardis, it appears small at a first glance, but when you walk through its doors, it’s bigger on the inside:




Examples of one line haiku (monoku)
written by Alan Summers
Here are just a few more of my one line haiku travelling the monorail over the years:






eye of the song a blackbird touching the void


Award credit:
Winning haiku 
The British Haiku Society Awards 2018
Haiku Section judge: 
Scott Mason (author, The Wonder Code)
Judge's commentary: https://area17.blogspot.com/2019/06/the-layering-of-meaning-beyond.html



each window its own night train


Award credit:
Honourable mention 
The British Haiku Society Awards 2018 
Haiku Section judge: 
Scott Mason (author, The Wonder Code)







at the end of the night snow fox

Publication:  Leaf-fall, Issue 1.1 ed. Akira Yagami (June 2019)




childhood river the sunlight as it falls

Publication: Presence #62 (November 2018)




shadows and first light chimney rooks


Publication: Presence #62 (November 2018)
fainter stars the bluebells shake out a morning

Alan Summers





where the river runs I glitter fish scales

Alan Summers

Sonic Boom, Issue Thirteen 2018


whale footprints the day begins in earnest 

Alan Summers
Sonic Boom, Issue Thirteen 2018

sunrise the gulls segue into the light

Alan Summers

Australian Haiku Society Summer Solstice Haiku String 2018 theme: change



courting foxes in midwinter the security of imagined daisy chains

Alan Summers
pins on a map: 3rd haiku anthology (Inhaiku Mumbai anthology) 
Inhaiku Mumbai ed. Rohini Gupta (November 2nd 2018)
from haibun: Batwoman




ground zero into the new friend's story

Alan Summers
Publications credits:

Masks 4 (Roadrunner 12.3 – December 2012) 
https://roadrunnerhaikublog.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/rr-12-3.pdf

Anthology credits: in fear of dancing: The Red Moon Anthology of English-Language Haiku 2013 www.redmoonpress.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=182 ISBN: 978-1-946848-24-9

Haiku 2014 ed. Scott Metz & Lee Gurga, Modern Haiku Press, 2014 (Joint Winner, The Touchstone Distinguished Books Award 2014)


under and over the river crossing bridges


Alan Summers
Honorable Mention
2018 Monostich Haiku Poetry Contest judged by John Stevenson

former president of the Haiku Society of America




train sitting:facingpeoplei’drathernot   

Publication credits: Raw NerVz (Summer 1995)



crowded train a dozen yellows crackle

Publication Credits: Does Fish-God Know (YTBN Press 2012)
ISBN-10: 1479211044 / ISBN-13: 978-1479211043




this small ache and all the rain too robinsong

Alan Summers
Publication credits: Modern Haiku vol. 44.1 winter/spring 2013



the blue note I turn to wind-spun snow

Alan Summers
Publication Credits:  
Blithe Spirit 23.4 (November 2013): The Haiku Calendar 2015 (Snapshot Press, 2014)

Award Credit: Runner-up, The Haiku Calendar Competition 2014



all those red apples amongst the blue tit

Publication credits: Bones - a journal for contemporary haiku Issue 0.1 2012 reissued 2013; Does Fish-God Know (Yet To Be Named Free Press 2012); Roadrunner 12.3 MASKS 4 (2012) https://roadrunnerhaikublog.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/rr-12-3.pdf


after rain midnight dreams a hedgehog 

Alan Summers
Publication Credit:   brass bell: a haiku journal
One-Line Haiku curated by Zee Zahava (Monday, September 1, 2014)


tearing up snow falls slowly a kind of blue

Alan Summers
Publication Credit:  Bones - a journal for contemporary haiku No. 3 (December 15, 2013)


Red Sea beat my heart still hydrozoa

Alan Summers
Publication Credits: Does Fish-God Know (Yet To Be Named Free Press 2012)
Does Fish-God Know:  https://www.amazon.com/Does-Fish-God-Know-Alan-Summers/dp/1479211044/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1478105696&sr=8-1&keywords=does+fish-god+know



petrichor this green sunsets in yesterday

Alan Summers
Publication Credits: Does Fish-God Know (YTBN Press 2012)



intermittent rain I shed another crow 

Alan Summers
Publication Credits: Frogpond autumn 2013 issue (36:3)



irezumi the river coils into heron

Alan Summers
Publication Credits: Frogpond autumn 2013 issue (36:3)



nautiluses who remember useful things for only a day

Alan Summers
Publication Credits: c.2.2. Anthology of short-verse ed. Brendan Slater & Alan Summers 
(Yet To Be Named Free Press 2013):  https://www.amazon.com/dp/1479304565



long hard rain my compass your true north

Alan Summers
Publications credits: Frogpond 36.1 • 2013



h=k=l=0 each love number sleeps

Alan Summers
Publications credits: Bones - a journal for contemporary haiku Issue 0.1 2012 reissued 2013; Does Fish-God Know (Yet To Be Named Free Press 2012)



rain on the river the jesus star shifting

Alan Summers
Publications credits: Janice M Bostok Haiku Prize 2012 Anthology Evening Breeze



sloe-eyed horses in Lichtenstein bubble gum wrappers

Alan Summers
Publication Credits: Roadrunner 12.3 MASKS 4



giallo this restricted area my birthplace

Alan Summers
Publications credits: 
bones journal Pre issue - Single haiku & Sequences (2012); Does Fish-God Know (Yet To Be Named Free Press 2012)



city of glass the immobilised man small stone counting

Alan Summers
Publication Credits: Blithe Spirit 23.3 (August 2013)



recurringdream#16.333iso/overbreakfast

 Alan Summers
Publications credits:
fox dreams (April 2012) ed. Aubrie Cox

n.b. There's a great exchange with Aubrie Cox, now Frogpond editor.  Just ask in the comments box and I'll reply. :-)



blues change the colour rain

Alan Summers
Publication Credit:   brass bell: a haiku journal
One-Line Haiku curated by Zee Zahava (Monday, September 1, 2014)



ants following invisible trials the children

Alan Summers
Publication Credits: Modern Haiku  issue 44:3 (2013)

n.b. The word 'trials' is intentional, a case of subverting the expected, as in readers expecting 'trails' but 'trials' suggests a deeper context.





wildflowers adding a little evening to the daylight

Alan Summers
Publication Credit:  Presence #52 (2015) 



dandelion wind swallows spin a chimney

Alan Summers
Publication Credit: Presence #53 2015 



green alkanet between the whispers rain

Alan Summers
Publication Credit: Blithe Spirit 25.4 (November 2015)

green alkanet: http://www.wildflowerfinder.org.uk/Flowers/A/Alkanet(Green)/Alkanet(Green).htm



I dream of swimming office blocks

Alan Summers
Publication Credit: Blithe Spirit 25.4 (November 2015)



cullingmoonmanycolorsuniform

Alan Summers
Publication Credit: 
sequence: Bones - journal for contemporary haiku no. 7 July 15th 2015



small-hours-train the pink suitcase of moon shadows

Alan Summers
Publication Credit: Brass Bell September 2015 Issue: One-Line Haiku:



Escher's apple escapes the mercury

Alan Summers
Publication Credit: Blithe Spirit 25.4 (November 2015)
From the haibun The Beat Is Back: 

lost childhood cars moonlight a rookery

Alan Summers
Publication Credit: Blithe Spirit 25.4 (November 2015)




far off Helvellyn snow the nouns of verbs 

Alan Summers
Publication Credit: Blithe Spirit 25.4 (November 2015)

Helvellyn in snow:
  1. http://www.stridingedge.net/walks/6108/
  2. https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=Helvellyn+snow&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjf2Jvow4rQAhWlD8AKHQfSAVEQsAQISg&biw=1260&bih=752


I once was this stone home for another

Alan Summers
Publication Credit: 
Bones - journal for contemporary haiku no. 7 July 15th 2015



dragonfly army I slip off the skins of men in pain

Alan Summers
Publication Credit: 
Bones - journal for contemporary haiku no. 7 July 15th 2015



Unforgiving rain I write my next epitaph in a dream

Alan Summers
Publication Credit: Asahi Shimbun, Japan, July 31 2015



a red kite whistles haymaking tractors

Alan Summers
Publication Credit: Muttering Thunder, volume 2 (November 2015)

RED KITES, and that eerie call:
At 10 minutes 33 seconds into this recording you get a fairly good capture of the unusual and eerie call of a red kite. I heard over half a dozen kites at one instance making these calls, like a haunting and spooky melody or film soundtrack: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p1SyluTQfHk




juniper the tether end of larksong 


Lake District, Cumbria, England, U.K. September 2015

Alan Summers
Publication Credit: Poetry & Place anthology issue 1
ed. Ashley Capes and Brooke (Close-Up Books, April 2016)




the mountain ash birdsong lichens



Lake District, Cumbria, England, U.K.



Alan Summers

Publication Credit: Blithe Spirit 26.1 (March 2016)




colour book the cat becomes marmalade

Alan Summers
Publication Credit: Right Hand Pointing issue 95 (h a i k u edition, February 2016)



moonlighting crows in other colors

Alan Summers
Publication Credit: Frogpond (39:1) Winter Issue 2016
Anthology Credit: 2016 HSA Member Anthology



the rain in our fingers return journey

Alan Summers
Publication Credit: Blithe Spirit 26.2 (May 2016)

not yet light the wall its black cat

Alan Summers
[earlier version] pub. brass bell: a haiku journal: April issue: one-line haiku 

sun off stubble a train in its landscape

Alan Summers
Publication Credit: 
otata 4 (April, 2016) An e-zine of haiku and short poems, Otata ed. John Martone



cusp month the housemartins field a meadow

Alan Summers
Publication Credit: Blithe Spirit 26.3 (2016)
haibun: Growing Pains Of The Fairy Tale Train
re May into June 2016

meadow borders the river clouds

Alan Summers
Publication credit: Presence #56 October 2016 issn 1366-5367
a river surreptitiously the heron

Alan Summers
Publication Credit: otata 11 (November 2016)
wolf rain my taste maps a cloud

Alan Summers
Publication Credit: otata 11 (November 2016)
https://otatablog.files.wordpress.com/2016/10/otata-nov-2016-2.pdf
https://otatablog.wordpress.com/2016/10/30/november-2016/ 
she carries the warm gun's child

 Alan Summers
Publication Credit: is/let magazine (January 2017)
https://isletpoetry.wordpress.com/2017/01/21/950/





an intercessory prayer to endless blue string

Alan Summers
Publication credit:   Blithe Spirit 26.3 (2016)
(haibun: Growing Pains Of The Fairy Tale Train)

Anthology credit:
EarthRise Rolling Haiku Collaboration 2017 Reconciliation (April 2017)


the chalk outline around a ring a ring a bag of jellybeans

Alan Summers
Publication credit:  MG8 (moongarlic issue 8 May 2017)





Habeas corpus I hold the other ghosts

Alan Summers
Publication credit:  MG8 (moongarlic issue 8 May 2017)



first swifts the sky turns out of its own blue

Alan Summers
Publication credit:  The Other Bunny (August 7, 2017)
The House On The Hill (ekphrastic haibun)





the war she never returned Vergissmeinnicht


Alan Summers
Publication credit: 
Haiku Canada Revew vol. 11 no. 2 (October 2017)  ed. LeRoy Gorman 

A literary allusion, as well as a comment on the brutality of war.

See:

"Vergissmeinnicht" by Keith Douglas, read by a young boy:

and 

"Vergissmeinnicht" by Keith Douglas (read by Tom O'Bedlam): 





lily-filled snoozing ducks the river is sky


Alan Summers
Publication credit: 
Presence issue #59 (November 2017)



wishbones the ritual with my mother


Alan Summers
Presence issue #59 (November 2017)

Note:

Daily Haiku:





river-moss the mallards feeding the day slowly

Alan Summers
Wales Haiku Journal issue one March 2018
(Chippenham, Wiltshire, UK)





fledgling moon stars slip thru bedroom windows

Alan Summers
ephemerae vol. 1 (April 2018)


in between the river denizens hurtling notes around


Alan Summers
A Sense of Place: THE SHORE – hearing ed. Kathy Munro (The Haiku Foundation)
where the butterflies went trailing fingers there

Alan Summers

Sense of Place - The Shore - Touch  ed. Kathy Munro (The Haiku Foundation)

 For anyone wanting to know more about writing one line haiku we can one-to-one sessions on one line haiku (monostich) aka monoku.
so do email Karen and myself:



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photo©Alan Summers














all those red apples | travelling the monorail
haiku travelling in one line©Alan Summers 2014-2015
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