What is Haiku?
Many people nowadays write Haiku poetry. It’s quite popular among the young generation of poets. However, a clear concept is needed to write a good Haiku poem.
Haiku is a Japanese form of poetry, written in 5, 7, 5, or moras (sound units) and should be unrhymed. Traditional Haiku in Japanese is written in a single vertical line. But in English, normally a Haiku is written in three lines – starting with a short line then a longer line and followed by another short line. In English, most Haiku is written with 5, 7, 5 syllables. The modern Haiku that are written in English normally follow the rule of three lines with 17 syllables.
Haiku poem is related to nature. Any Haiku like poem that is related to human emotion is called Senryu. Many writers do the mistake of mixing up these two forms. Although Senryu is written in the same pattern and form as Haiku (5/7/5 syllables) but Senryu deals with human emotion, psychological observations, humour etc.
Generally, Haiku express an imagination or a natural picture or even a string of thought. So only in three lines and 17 syllables, a poet needs to complete the whole picture. But it’s important that it should not look forceful. A Haiku needs to sound very natural. Also, each line of the poem should be independently distinctive and complete to create a imagery.
Because a Haiku poem consists of very few words and only 17 syllables, it is advisable to ignore filler words and articles as much as possible. This also means that word selection is very important for Haiku. Though many think that a Haiku can display two images in a single poem by creating a pivotal point (generally after the first line), but mostly a Haiku poem, written in the present tense reflects on nature and creates a single image.
Another important convention of writing Haiku is that only the first letter of the opening line of the poem should be written in upper case letter. Beginning of the rest of the two lines should be written smaller case. This may be because original Japanese Haiku consist only one line with 17 syllables.
In the end, I must say the distinction between Haiku and Senryu is not very absolute. Many modern poets have described that although Haiku should deal with matter of nature, but sometimes Haiku poem does reflect human emotions if you look at it closely.
Another important point of understanding Haiku is in what language you are writing it. This article described the form of Haiku that is written in English. A Japanese Haiku can be little different from the English one because of the differences of two languages. Traditional Japanese Haiku are often 17 syllables long but Japanese syllables are not equivalent to English syllables. Japanese Haiku use certain syllables to convey what is conveyed by punctuation in English. Thus an English exclamation point (no syllables) might use up one syllable in Japanese.
I hope this will help the readers to understand Haiku Poetry a little more.
Liked it
I always wondered about that, thank you for sharing this very beneficial content. I really enjoyed the read.
Informative!
I never knew what this is.
Very interesting, thank you.
Love these types of poems. Simple but oh so powerful in meaning.
I was interested in knowing more about haiku. Thank u for sharing.
Thanks for the explanation. I am more familiar with Chinese Poems since I ever studied them in school.
I like these types of poems. This is a great article because a lot of people are not aware of Haiku’s on Triond. I wrote a few of them and several people asked what it was. There are a few things that I learned too after reading your article. good work
I knew what a Haiku was but I had no idea that it only wrote about nature. I guess some of the Haikus I wrote are not in fact Haikus. Thanks or sharing.
good work, Earlier i was very confused about what it is this haiku. Now after reading your article i also come to know about haiku. Thanks for this article
I enjoy reading and writing haiku poems.
Darla Smith just taught me how a haiku is written
is this somewhat a haiku?????
5 7 5
” I love you my dear………………..5
in this universe see me……………7
the world is like thee……………….5
YOUR CONSIDERED VIEWS PL
AS I AM NO POET
YET I WRITE POETRY
sitting on a Christmas tree
i feel free
to all hearts steal
PLEASE NOTE SECOND HALF IS creativity
CREATIVITY ..IS BOUNDLESS
which is boundless and not a haiku at all
I have learned something, thank you. The article was very well written, and now I am going to look at some of your Haikus.
This was a very interesting article. I think that your article will help many people understand haikus.
Nice. Thank you for this information.
Thankyou for your comment on my recent post, This is very helpful, just the advice I was looking for.