judih wrote:
sweetwater, welcome.
It is said that the Japanese haiku form adhered to that syllable count, with the intent of addressing the present moment. The modern western style is far different. Present moment is paramount, nature good.
In writing haiku, the attempt is made to be as clear and in the moment as possible...
Yes.
At the risk of committing pedantry (which I believe is illegal in 12 states), the 5-7-5 count does not allude to syllables, but to phonemes called
onj, or
onji. They are only roughly analogous to English syllables, with no one-to-one equivalence; but on average, 17 onji are approximated by 12 to 14 English syllables. When I try adhering to a strict count, I like 3-5-3, or 4-6-4; but the structure of English differs enough from Japanese that these counts aren't always feasible. I wrote this 11-syl haiku some time ago: "birdseed enough until the evening grosbeaks", but breaking into 3-5-3 would render it "birdseed en/ough until the eve/ning grosbeaks". It made more sense to parse it 4-2-5: "birdseed enough/until/the evening grosbeaks". The standalone "until" also gave the piece a humorously dramatic pause before the punchline, I thought.
The short version: Strict syl counts are optional in contemporary haiku, but brevity is not. And it's appropriate to make the reader do some of the work, by suggesting an image (s)he may be familiar with. Also to link the outer landscape you're describing with some aspect of your interior life (something I need to work a lot harder at).
Anyhow - welcome! And write on!
