|
I
learned about Jack Kerouac's conception of the Western haiku,
and Michael Stipe's idea of sending a postcard to a friend,
every day for a year—each with a haiku scribbled on
the back. It was then I realized haiku is about simplicity.
Haiku is purity, a flicker of inspiration, a teaspoon of
beauty poured into everyday moments. Everyone can write
haiku, because beautiful, ordinary things happen all the
time. You just have to see them.
Children
see haiku best. They know about little things, like unwrapping
a candy bar, or whispering from the bottom bunk. To see
haiku you have to watch like a child watches: you have to
appreciate the gift in common things. Things like an unmade
bed, a leaf falling, or ice cream melting, and then take
and compose them into polaroid images, little pictures of
beauty hidden just under life's most childlike, most simple,
and most unexpected pleasures.
—
emily evans • may 2003
.
. . that's okay. Skip over this part. No, really. In a world
like today, there's hardly time to read an introduction
to . . . anything. Delayed gratification is a thing of the
past; these days it's all about how fast we can get something.
In conversation, we find ourselves sighing, "Get to
the point already!" And so I shall.
Haiku
does not seek to satisfy the reader with a bevy of details.
The author provides a mere suggestion of an idea, and leaves
the audience to fill in the rest. And it's the real meat
of the idea that the author skips around; rather, they provide
snapshots, previously unnoticed, unimportant details to
an event—and probably one that no one would ever think
is worth noting.
This
year has been an interesting one for me. I have found myself
an observer more often than a participant in life. Luckily,
haiku met me half-way and we formed a fine friendship. Haiku
has taught me the delight in small things, the importance
of what happens when the back is turned and the eyes are
shut, and more importantly . . . to breathe.
I
urge you to breathe many times throughout reading this collection.
Relish it. Then inhale again.
energy.
— j. may • may 2003
|
