Distinguishing Haiku from Senryu
I would suggest there is an insidious and subtle reason for the distortion in the artistic authenticity
and natural aesthetic quality of haiku. This distortion is being intensified today, and is the result of
humanities modern and technological progression apart from nature.
Traditional or classical Haiku is distorted when it’s confused with senryu. Often even well
intentioned poets, critics, publishers, and the media erroneously identify senryu as haiku. This is how
haiku's unique natural aesthetic is re-appropriated, and in a sense is gentrified by the A-W World.
Senryu that reference nature with human or manmade themes at the forefront, themes
which are not created or included as saijiki simply do not qualify as traditional/classical haiku. What is
saijiki? Saijiki is a list of kidai/seasonal topics, and kigo/seasonal words. Several regions, countries, and
organizations around the world have even created their own culturally and geographically specific saijiki.
These saijiki are usually derived from or are seasonally aligned with Japanese Saijiki. On the other hand
there is nothing wrong with non-traditional haiku that does not derive its kigo from saijiki. Still
there is a distinct difference between traditional/classical haiku, non-traditional haiku, and senryu.
Again when writing traditional/classical haiku Kidai/kigo are applied to the season one is
writing of. Japan's traditional/classical perception and categorization of seasons into a book of saijiki
differs from our A-W concept of seasons. This difference is where cultural and ethnic misconceptions of
how we perceive nature begins. It is our failure as haijin, to clearly define what is and isn't haiku, that
contributes to the public’s confusion, and ennui in regards to how haiku is defined. This has created a
haiku identity crisis in the A-W world, since it isn’t being definitively self defined in A-W terms. So the
A-W world treats traditional haiku as a divergent literary art form. An art form which acquires limited
tangible or artistic value in A-W society. This is where, how, and why ehi like haiku struggle in A-W
society. It is also part of why senryu is beginning to thrive, often under a guise indistinguishable from
haiku.
The primary distinction between senryu and traditional haiku can be discerned in how
haiku references nature as defined by kigo/kidai drawn from saijiki as its subject. So what does it mean to
have nature as the subject of a haiku? Well when writing traditional haiku nature is defined as anything
that is identifiable or listed as kigo/kidai. Saijiki does include some references to humanity or manmade
objects. Again this is where confusion can creep in. Since saijiki include references to humanity and
manmade objects, this does not give us free reign to begin speaking of manmade issues if they are not
included in saijiki. Although if we take the time to create our own saijiki, and list manmade issues under a
specific season then the poem can be called traditional haiku. Writing haiku derived from a list of saijiki
or kigo/kidai can simultaneously limit and expand the subject matter available to a haiku poet. Kigo/kidai
allow us to indirectly speak of nature without necessarily directly referencing nature, its plants, animals,
etc; to do so we have to use seasonal references/kigo or topics/kidai when speaking of humanity or
manmade objects.
Still when writing haiku outside of the geographic area of Japan I believe it is acceptable to
improvise if you will. If you are going to improvise then I think the kigo or kidai you use must reference
nature from the locale you are writing of. It is also perfectly acceptable to create your own book of
saijiki for your own geography, culture, ethnicity, etc as well. Again I want to reiterate there is nothing
wrong with writing senryu, or non-traditional haiku not derived from saijiki. I’m just trying to create a
clear framework for future distinctions between them.
Speaking of nature, and our interactive sources of discord
"The future direction of haiga is uncertain ... since it depends on the future of
haiku itself. ... powerful influences ... lead potential poets away from nature ...
away from extraordinary awareness of the seasons ... away from the
observation of minute but flavorful moments of daily life. Instead of the
traditional cycles of rural life ... there is now a pervading focus on urban
existence with its stress on products and possessions. Japanese like
Americans are ... deluged with mass entertainment ... we can only hope that
both haiku poetry and haiga will continue to serve as a counterweight to the
pressures of the modern world."
(Published by Marsh Art Gallery and the University of Richmond, in association with the University of
Hawaii Press. From the book entitled Haiga: Takebe Socho and The Haiku-Painting Tradition: Haiga and
Japanese Art)
Humanities discord, our dysfunction and/or maladaptive behavior in regards to the way we
interact with and perceive nature, have two sources. Though before I address these sources, I'll
speak to what I mean when I refer to “our natural interactions with nature”. When I speak of our
interactions with nature I’m speaking of our comfort level, in regards to when we live or spend time in a
forest or anywhere in nature for extended periods. I speak of existing and then thriving in a setting where
nature, her elements and the others living beings that coexist within it dictate to you, rather than you
imposing upon them. I speak of putting on a pack and living in a tent/shelter where there is no bathroom,
running water or electricity. Or living in a small cabin where protecting your food source from ants, mice,
and bears is as much a concern as stocking your wood stove or fireplace; where stoking that wood stove
or fireplace is not just for heat, but as a cooking and self defense source. To live in nature where dusk,
dawn, and the whims of the weather dictates what you do, rather then a job. This is what I mean when I
refer to "our natural interactions with nature”, especially in regards to our dysfunctional and/or
maladaptive interactions being the sources of our natural discord.
These sources of discord with nature have brought to the forefront a "distinctly" A-W form of
pastiche haiku. This form of poetry uses haiku's "cicada shell" if you will, its 5-7-5 or short-long-short
format. This form of poetry is then used to fill the inside of the cicada with mukigo instead of kigo
to create haiku's fraternal twin, senryu.
At least two of the sources of our discord are Abrahamic (Anglo-Western) maladaption and
Dharmic (Eastern) dysfunctionality, in regards to how most of us associate and interact with nature today.
Generally speaking, Dharmic origins have a preponderance of views that speak to nature as being seen as
divine in and of itself. While Abrahamic or A-W views maladaptively characterize humanity as
patriarchal, as imposing our interests upon nature, it treats nature as a resource for man, to tame or impose
Abrahamic order upon.
Think for a moment of the American painter John Gast, and his symbolic painting “American
Progress”. It acts as a sort of crude haiga. The symbology of the A-W world accompanied by text
that epitomized western domination.
Here is an excerpt from the text of the "Manifest Destiny" which often accompanied Gast's
painting."To control North America ... as god's chosen people ... to spread civilization, free market
capitalism, and Christianity ... to enlighten the world ... bringing light into the darkness".
These words and Gast's painting would come to personify the symbology of America’s westward
expansion or its “Manifest Destiny”. This manifest destiny was rooted in the belief that America was
there for the Christian man to tame, and take ownership of. North America was there for man to mold into
what he (not she) believed would best reflect Christian values. Never mind that this westward expansion
or manifest destiny required the annihilation of most, and the colonization of the remaining non Christian
Native communities that were already thriving where they wanted to expand. This colonization required
once again in Gandhi’s words, “the systematic destruction of their ... relationship with nature. Stripping
people of their collective notion of self … a prelude to ... the process of colonization ... (which) goes on
today under the name of 'development' wherein success is measured by the criteria of Westernization."
The Black Ships that would posture within range of Japan’s coastline were merely another
example of this expansion of America’s A-W Manifest Destiny, only played out in Asia. Again my point
is not to vilify our A-W society, but to make my literary point by critiquing it. Japan and China too
were/are empires, which do much the same in Asia. This has been the legacy of many of humanities more
aggressive and intersecting imperial societies. I’m just addressing how the world’s present Abrahamic A-
W society is influencing my literary art form, ehi/haiku today.
So as I’ve illustrated, this Abrahamic viewpoint sees nature as a place apart from God, as an
untamed godless place where man was banished to, from the garden of eden. This historicist perspective
immediately imposes a maladaptive Abrahamic view of nature upon those of us indoctrinated into this A-W way of faith, thinking, believing, and creating. No matter whether we identify as A-W or not, if we're born and raised in the western world, or are in the eastern world and are heavily influenced by the west (few aren't), we must then contemplate simultaneously being open to a multiplicity of religious or spiritual ways or possibilities. Ways of thinking, being, or even believing, and creating, to write aligned with haiku's Dharmic artistic aesthetic. For those of us born and raised in a Dharmic based eastern world we have to continually work at not manifesting the naturally maladaptive world’s dominant A-W concepts of nature that can create dysfunctional tendencies in the way we interact, with nature. Being able to not just coexist but thrive within the intersectionality of divergent ways of being, with and in nature is something Basho, Saigyo, Issa, Buson, and Taneda did not face on the level we do today.( More recently poets like Thoreau Emerson, Whitman, and Wright poignantly addressed these issues of nature, via transcendentalism and ethnic nationalism. Still though, these more modern A-W poets (especially Robert Wright) wrote more senryu rather then haiku poems. In comparison to haiku, the others wrote more so in a verse, prose, or haibun style in regards to transcendentalism. They also wrote more so of imposing upon nature, rather than of equally being of or a part of nature.
Still regardless of the reason, on some level most all humans on the planet suffer from some level of discord in regards to their interactions with nature. In the end much like social justice issues, the symptoms, causes, and solutions/treatments for the continued decline of haiku are intersectional. Again these intersectional causes and symptoms result in large part from A-W and self colonization, as well as Abrahamic-maladaptiveness and Dharmic dysfunctionality in regards to our interactions with nature. As a
result of our natural western tendencies to impose upon haiku, mukigo is being manifested as the gentrified tool used to supplant haiku. So once mukigo is substituted for kigo a poem ceases to be a haiku,
and is assimilated into a senryu. This assimilation occurs regardless of whether kigo or nature is
referenced in conjunction with non saijiki manmade subjects in a senryu. Again I'm not making an argument for or against senryu or haiku. I am instead speaking to what I perceive as the how and why of haiku's proxy gentrification by today's A-W interpretation of titular haiku, which in reality is actually senryu.
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