There are some writers who, at the same time as delivering a great story, do it using language so evocative, pure and sometimes even lyrical, that they are a true delight to read. These are our literary chicks.
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By Jenny Shepherd Haiku I wrap my thoughts in A blanket of seventeen, Secure syllables. 4 July 2007 I suppose that sort of sums it up! Being forced to fit your ideas into such a short and rigid format - three lines: of five, seven and five syllables – means you have to be really disciplined. Every word becomes a polished pebble: you can easily spend hours deciding between using "a" or "the". The whole process is like solving a Rubik cube. How do I get rid of that one syllable? How do I move that two-syllable word, so it isn't cut in half by the line-break? "Slender" is a much better word, because it almost rhymes with "silver", but it's too long... Writing a haiku makes you a craftsperson. It is also impossible to be gushy or "over the top". And it is that aspect that became especially important to me, when I started writing poetry again in April 2007, after some dreadful events, which have led me to divorce my husband. Maybe it would have been natural to "weep and wail and tear my hair" in rambling diatribes. And most people expressed great surprise at my restraint, when I showed them what I'd written, but everything that came to me, came in haiku, even on the first night. Without a Parachute You pushed me from the Plane. I long to hit the ground, So the fear will end. 9 April 2007 Maybe it was about having control over something in a situation of total chaos and horror? And perhaps the poems have a more powerful effect because they are so understated? A lot of people have said that the poems resonate for them; and I do feel that some of them could just as easily apply to a bereavement as to a divorce. Changing the Sheets Now that the last thing Which smelled of you has gone, for Ever has begun. 15 April 2007 It was a big moment when I wrote my first "non-divorce" or observational poem. It may not be a great work of art (if any of them are!), but it felt like the new me had arrived, or the me of 20 years ago was back... Summer Solstice I pivot on the Year's peak, and face the dark slope Down to midwinter. 22 June 2007 The proportion of divorce poems to non-divorce ones has continued to swing in favour of the observational poems. I seem obsessed with pigeons and pavements at the moment, and I'm also writing fewer haiku. I wonder what that means? Pigeon Pairing Two pigeons on a parapet - One climbs onto the other - I realise they are mating. A struggling of wings, A scrabbling of claws, A sliding of feathers - And it is over. He does not turn away then, But curves his neck around hers, Stroking her breast With his beak. 20 January 2008 You can read more of Jenny's verse at http://mostlyhaiku.blogspot.com/ |
| Posted: 18/03/2008 16:53:12 Last Updated: 18/03/2008 16:59:59 |
Chick Lit > Literary Chicks :: Why Do I Haiku?