The fact that a one word 'haiku' can appear in a widely read journal with so little comment or apparent controversy indicates how laid back the movement has become, and how either democratic or uncertain of its direction it currently is.
I say publish many more of these, so many that our explorations show how limited the poetic possibilities are and what a dead end they represent.
Garry– I'll admit, I'm a bit surprised by the lack of reaction too.
I do not agree about the limited poetic possibilities, however: I'm seeing a huge variety of techniques and styles in the work submitted to tinywords, from one word and one line poems to five-line tankas — and even a couple of paired haiku. We're trying to publish a body of excellent work that reflects that variety.
In fact there's an enormous potential range for haiku specifically, and for micropoetry in general. I'm very optimistic about that.
or is it just a joke without wanting to transmit globally valid poetical meaning to a weird puzzle?
by the way, the hungarian expression 'napnál világosabb' (brighter then the sun, meaning: it is absolutely obvious) is only a saying, not a micro poem…
Laszlo, it's partly a wordplay: the combination of "sun" and "unreal." By standing on its own it calls to mind an image of the sun, but one that is somehow unreal: Perhaps because its brightness is so great it exceeds our ability to see it directly. Or perhaps it is a sun shining through a veil of mist that makes it look strange, or a cloud cover that makes its appearance unexpected and out of place. The associations called to mind by the conjunction of the two words are, in my mind, evocative and rich.
One also thinks of Cor van den Heuvel's famous one-line haiku: tundra
One job of a successful poem is to help the reader see something in a new light. What I like about this one-worder is the newness it brings to a very obvious fixture in all our lives (sunlight) and, perhaps more successfully, the self-referential spotlight it puts on poetry and the very one-word poem itself. It asks us to think about it, decide for ourselves what makes a poem or what just doesn't quite make it. Well done, I'd say –Peter
June 24th, 2010 at 9:41 pm
Nicely done, Joseph. You covered a lot of ground with one word. A beautiful image and clever wordplay wrapped up in six letters. Wow!
June 25th, 2010 at 12:36 am
Unreal…
June 25th, 2010 at 1:21 pm
secreture
June 27th, 2010 at 4:38 am
what great possibilities this opens us to.
June 26th, 2010 at 5:09 pm
The fact that a one word 'haiku' can appear in a widely read journal with so little comment or apparent controversy indicates how laid back the movement has become, and how either democratic or uncertain of its direction it currently is.
I say publish many more of these, so many that our explorations show how limited the poetic possibilities are and what a dead end they represent.
the streaker
at the solar eclipse
one word haiku
June 26th, 2010 at 9:18 pm
Garry– I'll admit, I'm a bit surprised by the lack of reaction too.
I do not agree about the limited poetic possibilities, however: I'm seeing a huge variety of techniques and styles in the work submitted to tinywords, from one word and one line poems to five-line tankas — and even a couple of paired haiku. We're trying to publish a body of excellent work that reflects that variety.
In fact there's an enormous potential range for haiku specifically, and for micropoetry in general. I'm very optimistic about that.
June 28th, 2010 at 11:41 pm
unable to make sense out of it…
or is it just a joke without wanting to transmit globally valid poetical meaning to a weird puzzle?
by the way, the hungarian expression 'napnál világosabb' (brighter then the sun, meaning: it is absolutely obvious) is only a saying, not a micro poem…
not really happy with it…
June 29th, 2010 at 5:27 am
Laszlo, it's partly a wordplay: the combination of "sun" and "unreal." By standing on its own it calls to mind an image of the sun, but one that is somehow unreal: Perhaps because its brightness is so great it exceeds our ability to see it directly. Or perhaps it is a sun shining through a veil of mist that makes it look strange, or a cloud cover that makes its appearance unexpected and out of place. The associations called to mind by the conjunction of the two words are, in my mind, evocative and rich.
One also thinks of Cor van den Heuvel's famous one-line haiku: tundra
Like that one, this is a bit of a stunt as well.
June 30th, 2010 at 5:52 pm
perhaps S(un)2real (2 is supposed to be an exponent) would have been the correct way of putting it…
with a mother tongue other than english I had only two potentional solutions in mind: Sun + real & Sun + reel…
in S + unreal for me S doesn't stand for Sun – it stands for nothing…
in my opinion tundra (which was – up to now – totally unknown for me as one-word haiku too) has exhausted all the possibillities for a one-word haiku…
anyway, Dylan, thanks for your explanation…
July 2nd, 2010 at 6:55 pm
One job of a successful poem is to help the reader see something in a new light. What I like about this one-worder is the newness it brings to a very obvious fixture in all our lives (sunlight) and, perhaps more successfully, the self-referential spotlight it puts on poetry and the very one-word poem itself. It asks us to think about it, decide for ourselves what makes a poem or what just doesn't quite make it. Well done, I'd say –Peter
June 18th, 2011 at 7:59 am
nice world it sounds so sunrealistic