This week’s poem is a haiku.
It’s an autumn haiku, relating the movement of the season as indicated by autumn leaves changing colors.
The thing about the haiku form is that it has many traditional expectations, at least if it is practiced in the Japanese manner. Some of those expectations come over into the English reasonably well–the syllabic 5-7-5 pattern, for example, seems reasonably adequate to translate the short-long-short of the Japanese 17-unit structure.
What’s more complicated to translate are all the cultural expectations. Inclusion of a seasonal indicator, for example, of which tradition supplies certain accepted variants. (Think, cherry blossom = spring.) But there are other cultural signifiers, such as the connotation of color or other words associated with feeling or atmosphere, which simply don’t translate so easily. Examples can be found at this link to Five Hundred Essential Japanese Seasonal Words.
So, in the case of haiku, what first appears simple, becomes more and more complex, the more you study it. Poets.org has a good intro definition of haiku at this link. That’s a good place to start. From there, the internet is your oyster.
Autumn in the NE U.S. is full of color–a last burst right before we begin a several month study of gray tones. Haiku is a form that relies on the image to do the work, and color of leaves in autumn is a primary seasonal image. But the best part of imagery-dependent poems is that they remind you how the image itself can be described but never be fully explained. It simply exists, as much in the mind of the receiver as the poet.
We’re at that part of Autumn in NE Ohio where we can expect a handful more stunningly sunny and clear days, interspersed with rain and gloom. On those few clear days, however, the sky is a deep blue unequalled even in summer–probably it is the crispness of the air that makes it seem that way. You can see the deep blue in the picture below, where the brown, dry thistles stand out against the sky,
In the photo below, and at the opening of this post, you can see how bright the red leaves are, and the brilliant blue peaking through. But this won’t last long.
Autumn Leaves
Flaming maple tree
Faded brown crackles aground
Bare branches shiver
Well, it’s that time of year in NE Ohio.
Winter is just around the corner. You can’t enjoy the bright colors of Autumn without remembering also their impermanence.
If you enjoyed Autumn Leaves
You can read another haiku post of mine here: Silence, falling snow
If you are interested in a modern take not on haiku but short poems for a texting generation, see my comments on this book by Fady Joudah, Textu.
You’ll find more of my poems on this blog or in the collection Stars Crawl Out From Their Caves, which is available in both ebook and print.
Missed a poem of the week? Links to prior weeks are on this page.