The Moon as Companion
Susan August has written four books of
Haiku that I have previously reviewed. I
find her work well crafted and a delight to read. August covers a wide range of topics in a
crisp, no frills style. Here is one of
her Haiku that I particularly enjoy:
walking late at night
in a city far from home
the moon is shining
(Haiku Applecart, Susan August, page 26)
Again, notice the sparseness of the
style. There are no modifiers, no
adjectives or adverbs, in the Haiku. The
lineation is straightforward: each line is a grammatical unit. Line 1 is a verb phrase. Line 2 is a prepositional phrase. Lines 1 and 2 lead up to Line 3 which is a
simple sentence. There is a word used in
the Quaker tradition that, I think, describes the esthetics of this Haiku: the
word is ‘Plain’. If you go into an old
Quaker Meeting House there are no decorations, no icons or statues, not even a
pulpit or cross. All you will find are
rows of wooden benches. This is ‘Plain’. It means simple, unadorned. This Haiku reminds me of that kind of Plain
presence. Plain as applied to Haiku
style refers to a lack of figurative language; there are no metaphors, similes,
or other poetic techniques. The Haiku
does not rhyme or use metrics. The only
determiner of lineation is grammar, which is used effectively and is sufficient
for clarity.
The line count is the classic 5-7-5 of
traditional Haiku and the count feels completely natural to the English
language. The Haiku seems to arise
effortlessly out of an English language context.
August’s Haiku uses the technique of pivot
where Line 2 is kind of a hinge. Reading
Lines 1 and 2:
walking late at night
in a city far from home
We have a simple statement of an activity.
Reading Lines 2 and 3:
in a city far from home
the moon is shining
We have another simple statement, a simple
observation.
Line 2 functions to unite the two parts of
the Haiku.
Notice also what is left out: the city is
not named and the phase of the moon is not explicitly referenced. In traditional Haiku from Japan, where a Saijiki
is used, this would be a Fall seasonal Haiku.
This is because when the word ‘moon’ is used it is automatically used as
a Fall Season Word, unless the Haiku explicitly says otherwise. The moon of the Haiku, or its energy, fits
the Fall season, and I’m willing to go along with the traditional attribution,
though I don’t know if August intends it that way. As a westerner she may have wanted to be
deliberately ambiguous about the season.
Either way, it is effective.
Also left out is any description of the
person who is walking late at night. Is
the person male or female? What is their
age? Why are they in a city far from
home? To visit family?, for work?, to
give a talk?, perhaps they plan to move?, perhaps they are starting a new
career or going to college? All of these
questions remain open in the presence of this bare description of an act.
This Haiku is amazingly open-ended and it
is that open-endedness that allows the reader to enter into it. Each reader will fill in the Haiku with
details, but those details will differ for different readers. In addition, those details will change for a single
reader over time.
I enjoy the way the Haiku moves from the
individual person to the celestial in a stepwise manner. Line 1, ‘walking late at night’, is about a
person. Line 2, ‘in a city far from home’,
is the larger setting, the city, in which the walking occurs. Line 3 expands the setting of the Haiku
further by noting the presence of the moon.
So in each line the Haiku moves outward, expanding the context; moving
from an individual concern to a celestial dimension. This is done so simply, so naturally, that
the reader does not feel that the movement is forced or manipulated. It is very skillful.
I also a feel a kind of resolution in this
Haiku. The movement to the celestial
presence of the moon unites the individual walking through the city with the
people who are still at home. The
individual is far from home, but the moon in the sky is shared by the person
walking and by those who still remain at home.
They share the moon and so the moon becomes, in this Haiku, a companion
and a dispeller of loneliness.
It is the sparseness of a Haiku like this
that allows us to return to it; for each time we come back to it we can find
new possibilities, and new ways to explore its possibilities.
