Karen Brain   Essay on Margaret Chula's Haiku Comparison of Chula & Rotella's Haiku

Full Moon Above: Selected Haiku Writer's Introduction My final haiku collection, Full Moon Above, is comprised of what I thought was the best haiku that I wrote this semester. I decided to put in the haiku that best represented how I feel haiku should be and how it should be received. I think the major thing about haiku that I learned this semester is that haiku can be so many different things to so many different people. As we witnessed in class, sometimes a certain haiku would be interpreted in so many different ways. One haiku in particular was about a mother and daughter talking around mounds. Some students took that to be about a mother and daughter talking while planting flowers; some students took it to be a talk taking place in a graveyard. That discussion on that particular haiku illustrated the beauty of haiku poetry. Each different haiku has multiple ways that the readers can receive it and interpret it. I think my approach to haiku is to take a seemingly simple event or occasion and try to bring a new point of view to that occasion through a haiku. For example, two of my favorite haiku where I do that are: two friends by still water reveal secrets the owl asks "whoo-who?" wild yellow dandelions Dad's weedwhacker safely stored in the garage In the first haiku, I was trying to show a private conversation taking place between two good friends on a camping trip. While they are conferring privately, they forget that even nature (the owl in this case) is curious and nosy about what they are gossiping about in their conversation. I wanted the readers to see the point of view of the owl that was hovering above and listening to this ‘private’ conversation. In the second haiku, I was trying to make my readers think about how safe nature is in the wild. That even with all the technologies (the weedwhacker for instance) that sometimes even the simple, harmless dandelion is still safe from the danger of technology. I basically just wanted the readers to give some thought into how nature feels, or even break it down to how safe, or unsafe, those yellow dandelions feel in nature. With many of my haiku, I simply try to capture a moment from my memory into a haiku. For example: Easter Sunday morning: Dad fidgets with his necktie dull drone of the lawnmowever outside the window— no student has the answer With the first haiku, I was simply remembering how every year my father goes to Easter service in his entire suit, and he always ends up playing with his tie when it begins to bother him at the end of the long service. I wanted to connect the formality of Easter Sunday with my Dad’s fidgeting. In the second haiku, I wanted to capture a moment that I will never forget. Last semester when I was in a class, the professor asked a question and waited for an answer. However, it was three in the afternoon and it was a beautiful day after four days of downpour. It was obvious that everyone in that class wanted to be outside, especially when the lawnmower kept going past our window, and it would remind us of the beautiful day we were missing. When that professor stopped for an answer, all I could hear was the lawnmower. I did not care about the question, or the answer, all I could think about was that lawnmower outside in the sun. That seemingly simple moment was what I wanted to capture in this haiku. Overall, what I wanted to do with my haiku was try to create a moment out of my memory. Yet I wanted to make it specific enough to give some guideline to the readers as to what they should think when they read the haiku, but I also wanted to make it vague enough so that the reader could take his or her own memory and insert it into the haiku. That is the beauty of haiku. —Karen Brain Reader's Preface Karen Brain’s haiku depict life events from childhood to present. She captures the often overlooked sights and sounds of everyday life, such as the sound of a lawnmower during class, or how seeing a familiar object fills you with apprehension or joy. One of my favorite haiku is: walking down the aisle the bride keeps one step ahead of her father The daughter is so anxious to get married that she can’t help but walk faster down the aisle. This haiku is also a little sad, because maybe it is the father who is slowing down, trying to stop time in a sense, so his daughter won’t grow up so fast. Kathleen nicely sets up the image with room for interpretation on this festive, yet also a little sad, day. —Amanda M. Young