Pitch-black night sky cries,
lights of heaven hide from sight
hyenas laughing.
I’m getting addicted to writing haikus, been doing this since last night. I tried it first for Blacklight Candelabra’s writing challenge for the week and I just can’t get over it. Should be limiting myself to three for now, or else I won’t be able to write anything else for the next days, apart from haikus.
Featured Photo from www.listofimages.com
Hundred feet pairs made
monotonous marching sound
in rage, off to work.
Featured photo edited by blogger from the www.gettyimages.com original.
Across bushy trees:
warm winds blow leaves into dancing,
the lake lay still.
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Tried my hand at writing a haiku as a response to this week’s challenge from The Blacklight Candelabra | Advanced Writing Challenges, a writing event I joined only recently. Thinking Japanese always gets my favourite Asian novelist to mind–Natsume Soseki, who is also considered a master of the Haiku. He’s really good, I first wrote about him here if you would like to read. For 3 lines and 13 words, I spent a good three hours imagining how Soseki would translate my thoughts into writing—I’ve decided right away that the subject will be the photo above which I took two weeks ago when I went for a leisurely hike at the Botanical Gardens in Blue Mountains. I had to transport myself back into that moment when I was right inside that scene. It was a perfect day under the hot summer sun, the warm breeze brushing my cheeks. I remember how the tranquil lake made me feel so refreshed—it was so relaxing.
Now on to what the challenge was about, more than writing a Haiku—one has to come up with a Culturally and Linguistically Authentic Haiku in three ways: (1) form – which got me reading about Haiku’s different legitimate forms, (2) Syllable structure and consonant restrictions, and (3) The subject matter NATURE–as traditional Japanese as it can be. More than painting nature into words, I’ve learned in this challenge that Haiku is about human transformations—the nature within. From the Blog Event post, this quote appears (which made me linger longer on the challenge than I would have if it wasn’t there):
“[…] one thing that I think makes a real haiku is when the changes in nature reflect deep transformations in oneself.”
-Steve McCarty
So there goes my first haiku. I hope I made Soseki proud. It would have been an honour to call him Sensei.
I am the purist, the absolute.
I’d rather have it whole or nothing at all.
I persevere and am resolute.
I neither doubt nor fear, I know who to call.
I am the unpopular and outdated,
accused offensive and close-minded.
Though I’m the idea long lost in Eden,
I stand my ground, I wait for heaven.
Unwelcome in this world, I strive to be heard.
Small voice, big message, who will take heed?
Give me a chance I plead, you have been misled!
Of this good news, won’t all be in need?
Wise men insist I’m nothing but cowardice.
They hold fast to their ‘to dare is to live’
They say “I’d rather break than sway with the breeze”
But pray if they do, will they then believe?
I was once that damn fool, too. I’m no better
’til one did come to give me his name.
He touched me and threw the old into the fire
—that bloody-minded, ramrod-backed aim.
I am wisdom wandering to everywhere.
On history’s pages, there I am found.
I fought against death to tell about power,
Hope that makes even the empty abound.
Does it not take more courage to leave oneself,
Kill what you knew, abandoning all?
Is it weakness to leap and jump to a cliff,
Trust but in one to not let you fall?
When everybody laughs and says I’m a fool,
I look up, trust he knows more than I.
Am I not the one always labelled uncool?
You act like you’ve got sole right to cry!
I have it easy you say, you’re the rebel.
But is not the world applauding you?
The new world grows weary of me, I can tell.
I’m unbent though, I’ll uphold what’s true.
One day I’m certain the light will shine.
Those who now are blind will discern at that time.
On that day I dread not to be me.
I’m no fancy idea, in time you’ll see.
“But God shows his love for us in that
while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”
And is that not enough for me to live by?
What good is this life? A short mission!
So what now, what kind of idea am I?
The one Christ died for—I am Christian.
I wrote the poem above as a response to The Blacklight Candelabra Event‘s January 12 challenge, “What Kind of Idea Are You?” based on Salman Rushdie’s novel “Satanic Verses.” This quote from the book was turned into the participants’ writing challenge:
“What kind of idea are you? Are you the kind that compromises, does deals, accommodates itself to society, aims to find a niche, to survive; or are you the cussed, bloody-minded, ramrod-backed type of damn fool notion that would rather break than sway with the breeze? – The kind that will almost certainly, ninety-nine times out of hundred, be smashed to bits; but, the hundredth time, will change the world.”
This poem is also in response to Blogging 201’s assignment on participating to blog events. I responded to this challenge through a poem ’cause I wanted to try my skills at poetry. So I’m also joining another event, How Do I Love Thee Poetry Party that challenges participants to write a poem about love. I’m an amateur poet but I absolutely loved writing this. I’m passionate about what I was writing about and the challenge was really mind-boggling. I’d say poetry writing is therapeutic, something everyone should try. So why not grab your pen and try it now?
*I would like to apologize if the poem’s font size is too small for you. I need to accommodate mobile users and using this font size is the only way I retain the poem indentations and style on a mobile view. I will change the font size back to regular once I discover how to adjust the mobile view only.
Featured photo was taken from www.wallpapervortex.com
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