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WHC Renku Seminar
Haikuforum Seminar on "Traditional" Renku in English
Session 5: "A Shiny Icicle," The First Game Begins
Paul MacNeil
It is a long held custom that the most revered writer or senior master in a renku group is given the honor of going first. In a democratically aligned partnership, it can be the one who comes up with the best hokku, first-verse haiku, or we may take turns. It may fall to the one who suggested the session. Basho himself often asked others to take that first place. It is also customary for the host/hostess of the session to go second. Via the Internet? It can be anyone either first or second. Susumu-san, in his wonderful Glossary of Japanese Renku Terms, gets at a bit of this as he describes the rise of hokku as independent entities (definition #7). A friend has told me of the pressure on one who, by surprise, is asked by a renku session master to begin. This is one reason why players come to sessions armed with a collection of their original haiku, memorized, so as to be able to pick one if the master called on them. Then, with some pause, a facial expression of agony followed by beatific thoughtfulness, perhaps if a man -- stroking a beard, the chosen one declaims his or her verse. If it is not accepted by the master, the
crestfallen individual can make real expressions this time and fall back on another prepared at home -- and hope.
We shall divide the role of the master equally. I, myself, am certainly no higher than my partners, Peggy and Ferris. Each verse when shared is a proposed verse. It is not done with until each of the partners approves. This doesn't have to be a formal process, indeed, most partners in renku either are or soon become friends. A guideline for playing this non-Western "game" is to check your ego at the door. There is no one-upsmanship. We all will make mistakes, and each of us hopes that we or our partners will catch our mistakes in time for correction. In fact it is a duty of each member of the team to honestly scrutinize a proposed stanza for how it sits with "Tradition."
Once a verse is approved and covered by the next one, I am rarely in favor of any major editing. Other writers may disagree. Certainly small things such as switching articles or even clause order can be done with a reason. Major changes of adding to a verse that has already been replied to, or deleting from it should be avoided. As we will experience together later in the seminar, a kasen gets quite long, and it's harder and harder to stay clear of rule violations. Renku to 100, and they are done today, seem unimaginable to me. In renku there is a flow of the group's thinking. Images and their variety, the pulse and mood are all an organic thing -- a process in renku. A series of stimuli allow the creation of subsequent verses. They inspire them. In parallel, the presence of wording or subject matter in early verses precludes even going in certain directions. It is a tapestry. After the warp is blocked tight in a loom, it is hard to later pull and replace a yarn. Most of the time it will show as a defect. Back editing, rather than simultaneous suggestion, is harmful to the whole.
Let the game begin! (proclaimed with chalice raised, spilling nary a drop)
Winter Shisan for three partners: Paul MacNeil (A); Peggy Willis Lyles (B); Ferris Gilli (C)
a shiny icicle
on the sidewalk --
pieces end-to-end
1 - pm
the form:
verse# /Season /player A-C
1 winter A - hokku
2 B
3 C
4 B
5 A
6 C
7 B
8 A
9 C
10 A
11 autumn B
12 autumn C
Somewhere between 2 and 10 will be, in order, two springs together, then one summer verse. Within #'s 2-10 will be two love verses together. The one moon can light up any of the season verses (6 of them) including the hokku. One of the spring verses should be the sole flower verse.
Each partner gets 4 verses; 2 are three-liners. The rest is up to the partners as they write. The form was made with consideration that each writer may follow both of the others.
BIO's
LYLES, PEGGY WILLIS: lives with her husband in Tucker, Georgia. They have a daughter, a son, and three grandchildren. She earned her B.A. from Columbia (S.C.) College and an M.A. in English from Tulane University; where she was a Woodrow Wilson Fellow for 1960-61. Peggy taught briefly at Sophie Newcomb College, High Point (N.C.) High School, High Point College, and the University of Georgia. She was Poetry Editor of a regional magazine Georgia Journal from 1980-85.
For more than twenty years her haiku have been widely published in the US and abroad. Her work is included in many anthologies, including The Haiku Handbook, 1985, and Haiku World, 1996, both edited by William J. Higginson; The Haiku Anthology, 2nd and 3rd editions, 1986 and 1999, edited by Cor van den Heuvel; Remember That Symphonies Also Take Place In Snails, edited by John and Joanne Judson, 1989; The Rise and Fall of Sparrows, edited by Alexis Rotella, 1990; Haiku Moment, edited by Bruce Ross, 1993; A Haiku Path, the Haiku Society of America, 1994; snow on the water, the Red Moon Anthology for 1998; the thin curve, the Red Moon Anthology for 1999; and the forthcoming Global Haiku, edited by George Swede and Randy Brooks. Her two miniature chapbooks are Red Leaves In the Air, High/Coo Press, 1979, and Still At The Edge, Swamp Press, 1980. She has won awards from Modern Haiku, the Museum of Haiku Literature, the Hawaii Education Association, Wind Chimes Press, the Henderson Contest, Brussels Sprout; Haiku Quarterly; Woodnotes; The Mainichi Daily News, the New Zealand Poetry Society, the 2nd Annual People's International Haiku Contest, the HPNC 1999 International Senryu Contest, and the Snapshot Press Haiku Calendar 2000 Competition.
You can read her work on-line at Poetry in the Light; the English-Language Haiku Web Site; The Heron's Nest; and Pinecone: the North Georgia Haiku Society.
She says, "I think of contemporary English language haiku as something we poets are creating together. I enjoy reading haiku as much as writing them and consider many haiku poets 'mentors at a distance.'"
GILLI, FERRIS: lives with her husband in Orlando, Florida. Ferris previously lived for two years in Paraguay and four years in Germany. When she is not bird watching or writing haiku, she writes novels, repots plants, and speaks long distance with her daughter.
Ferris Gilli earned first place in the 1998 Alabama Sakura Haiku Competition and fourth in 1999. Also in 1998 she won third prize in the Herb Barrett contest. She was among the ten winners of the 2nd Annual International People's Haiku Contest and won Honorable Mention in the Yuki Teikei Haiku Society East-West 99 Hokku Contest and in the 1999 Harold G. Henderson Awards. Ferris's haiku, tanka, haibun, and renku have appeared in Cicada, Modern Haiku, Frogpond, Acorn, Raw Nervz, Haiku Spirit, Presence, Tundra, and Lynx. Her work has been selected to appear in The Art of Haiku 2000; American Haibun & Haiga 1999; The Red Moon Anthology of English-Language Haiku 1999; and Snapshots. Her poems can be seen online at Poetry in the Light, Reflections, Haiga Online, The Heron's Nest, Chaba, Pickings, and Templar Phoenix.
Peggy and Ferris, let us title our correspondence to each other for this shisan:
Renku Seminar, Icicle, # (verse # under discussion).
And, because it is short, let's show the whole form under the list of stanzas as it grows. Try not to send copies with ">" on each line. They get pretty dense by the time you get to 12 verses.
"Icicle" is a working title only. The partners will name it when done. Of course Peggy, Ferris and Paul will address each E-mail to the haiku forum. If others in the forum have a question as we go, we'll be glad to try to answer. Please do not post a verse to this renku -- this short one is limited to the trio described above.
It is now Peggy's turn. Go for it!
- Paul (MacNeil)
Tue Feb 17, 2000
Originally posted to WHChaikuforum as the fifth essay-lesson in the Haikuforum Seminar on "Traditional Renku in English".
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