Haiku. A haiku is a traditional Japanese three-line poem. It has five syllables in the first line, seven in the second line, and five in the third. A traditional haiku presents an image to arouse in the reader a specific emotional state. Contemporary poets have adapted the form for other purposes.
Imagery. An image is language that describes something that can be seen, heard, touched, tasted, or smelled. The images in a literary work are referred to, when considered altogether, as the work’s imagery. A haiku usually presents one or more images to capture a moment of reflection. Describe the images in the following haiku. What sensory details create the images? Make a cluster chart for each poem. Write the central image of the poem in a center circle. Around the center circle, add sensory details that contribute to the image.
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• Translating poetry is an extremely difficult task. Poetry, even more than prose, is tightly linked to culture and to subtle meanings in language. While some people say that poems should be translated literally, word for word, others feel that the essence of the poem is the important thing. If meaning is the part of a poem that must be translated from one language to another, other aspects of the poem are often lost. The original poem’s rhyme and rhythm, for example, may be lost in the translated verse. In these translated haiku, for example, the traditional five-syllable/seven-syllable/five-syllable lines have been changed.
• Haiku is a poetry form that originated more than five hundred years ago in Japan. The haiku tradition stems from a close observation of nature. The haiku is also characterized by seemingly simple reflections that really offer complex ideas.
What do you hear when you sit perfectly still and listen to everything around you?
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