Poetics

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Poetics

by Glennis Hobbs

The Canku: A New Poetical Form

In his History of Haiku Ryu, Yotsuya states that Basho Matsuo is known as the first great poet in the history of haikai (and haiku) and started writing these around 1680. (http://www.big.or.jp/~loupe/links/ehisto/ebasho.shtml)

Another writer, George Swede, claims that the haiku originated in Japan over six hundred years ago and is one of the oldest poetic forms in history and that the English-speaking world did not become aware of it until after Japan opened its doors in 1868. (A history of the English Haiku)

Traditional haiku format is three lines: five syllables in the first line, seven in the second, and five again in the last.

Peter Frengel defines the intention of haiku is “to capture a moment, typically a moment in the natural world, and to capture that moment in such a way as to render an insight, or epiphany.” He adds that haiku makes use of “ seasonal words, or imagery that evokes a season. Words like "cherry blossoms" (spring), or "spiders" (summer) are used to anchor the haiku in a set of associations. Seasonal words are a common strain in haiku, and in Japan there are many volumes devoted to recurring seasonal imagery.” (American haiku)

Traditional haiku tended to use nature and man’s place in nature for its theme. Contemporary 21st century haiku poets use any subject matter whether or not it relates to nature. Contemporary haiku often deals with urban settings, technology, romance, sex and overt violence. (Contemporary haiku)

Further research finds that Jane Reichold lists 47 different rules for writing haiku in her article, "Haiku Rules That Have Come And Gone."

Get the picture? The haiku is very formal, and very traditional. One tends to form the notion that a haiku is a formal poem which was written on special paper and which was presented formally to the Emperor at a special time of the year.

Inevitably some poets rebelled against the formality of the haiku. One such person was Ian Gordon who also writes under the name of Bob Zagunda. He invented a form called the Canku.

I recently had the opportunity to interview Lenny Everson, a Canadian poet who has done a lot of work in the genre of the Canku.

T-Zero: The Writer's E-Zine: What is the Canku form of poetry?

Everson: A Canku is a poem with

1. A title of up to ten words
2. Three lines, totalling 17 syllables.

T-Zero: The Writer's E-Zine: Who invented the Canku form?

Everson: Canadian poet Ian Gordon who also writes under the name of Bob Zagunda rebelled against the formality of the haiku. His mother, poet Katherine Gordon, says he “...loves the compact form of poetry, believes it often says MORE. He also balked at the rigidity of Haiku as unable to express some of the artistic unconscious of a Canadian perspective. He felt a strong title followed by a flexible 15 to 17 syllable format in any chosen line pattern, conveyed the best dramatic impact."

T-Zero: The Writer's E-Zine: How did the Canku get its name?

Everson: Since this was a purely Canadian form of compact poetry he dubbed it Canku.

T-Zero: The Writer's E-Zine: Are there any variations of this form?

Everson: There are no other variations, unless you include the sequence "Hobbsian Set." This comes from a parody of the philosopher Thomas Hobbes. He argued against the 18th century idea that primitive people lived in earthly Edens. Life without modern civilization, he said, was usually "nasty, brutish, and short."

T-Zero: The Writer's E-Zine: What do you feel are the advantages of using a Canku?

Everson: The advantages are that the form is suited to the English language, where the haiku is not.

The haiku is a fine and lovely form of poetry, but in English it's just a pale shadow of its original Japanese form. You can write a haiku that mentions a rose and a thorn, and understand that it's just not about growing flowers. There's a sub-message about love and its problems, or maybe life and its problems.

In Japanese culture, and in the Japanese language there are half a dozen other subtexts, stated, implied, inferred, and symbolized, from that same image. Add one more image to the same poem and it would take a long essay to just begin to tell what the poem's about.

Most of the time in English, you're lucky if you get more than a pretty picture from a haiku.

Someone told me that the 17 syllables in Japanese are 17 characters. If this is true, and given the fact that a Japanese character can stand for a whole English phrase, then a haiku in Japan is several times as "long" as one in English.

The addition of a title and the freeing of format of the 17 syllables go a little way towards rectifying this imbalance. Only part way, but it makes the Canku a very much friendlier form than the haiku for English-speaking poets.

T-Zero: The Writer's E-Zine: Are there any limitations to using the Canku form?

Everson: The form is quite flexible as long as it follows the two rules stated in answer 1. Personally, I'd like to see just how flexible it could be made. Poets should experiment. I'd like to see a Canku where one line is just a syllable—or even two lines are parts of a word, with the other 15 syllables tied up in the third line. Just for fun.

If Canku doesn't exploit its freedoms, it's just a haiku for the bored.

T-Zero: The Writer's E-Zine: Is there a writer’s and/or support group for poets interested in trying the Canku form?

Everson: Not at the present time.

T-Zero: The Writer's E-Zine: Is there a website for Cankus?

Everson: The Canku Page at http://patcp.netfirms.com/Cankupag.htm.

T-Zero: The Writer's E-Zine: Have you published a book of Canku poems? If not, do you have any plans to publish a book or anthology of Canku?

Everson: I haven’t published one yet, but I would recommend Bob Zagunda’s book of Canku entitled “Nutshells.”

As we search for different poetic forms we find that poetry is constantly changing and being challenged to new forms. The Canku is indeed a challenging form.

I have included several Cankus to illustrate this form, including both single and extended Cankus. The name of the author precedes the poem.

SINGLE SEQUENCE CANKUS

Lenny Everson:

Roots in a Storm, Wings in the Sunlight

Not both at once!
If you try to have both at once
You must lift the world.

A Canku May Be Blessed with a Ten-Word Title

For the rest
Is what you think best
And however you want to arrange it

Gwen Austin:

Creator Sea

Ssush--st-st-st-swush, pebbles
tumble
into sand, whisper to sea

Helen V. Lundt:

We Didn’t Know How Close We’d Be

One’s older; another, younger.
Apart as youngsters,
closely we age.

Mo Swanson:

Saturday Morning Wake-up even if They Wanted to Sleep in

Wind slams door--
everybody awakens.
Saturday morning's here.

Christine Bloom:

While You Are Gone This Summer

I work in the garden everyday,
Pull weeds, coax flowers
To bloom.

Helen Montgomery:

Resting in the hammock at sunset

lingering gold light
dense waft of peony and lilac
night distills

Campfire

trail of smoke lifts
illumines ghostly birches
dances into night

Janice Oestermeyer:

Viewing Nature’s Awesome Drama – Act One

Lone deer
out of woods, into yard – stares at us.
We stare back in wonder.

EXTENDED SEQUENCE CANKUS
Lana Wiltshire Campbell:

Summer Solstice

At Druid dawn,
the Helestone ignites our hearts
with ancient memory

In midday sun
Stonehenge encircles us,
its tall stones cast no shadow

Through the shortest night
we dance, sing and remember
around bonfires

Glennis Hobbs:

Storm

white, yellow lightning sheets
stealthily creeps closer
fireworks in night sky

forked blue lightning jag
slashes dark skies
like a flashing discotheque ball

evergreens sway in gale
rock branches sideways
announce coming storm

thunders claps
silver cat burrows into cushion
to seek protection

cloudbursts puddle deck
kittens skedaddle inside
protest being drenched

rain drums against windows
seeking entrance through open screens
spring cleansing

BIOGRAPHIES

At 59, Lenny Everson is lifelong poet and canoeist. He is known as North America’s Poet of the Canoe. He is the author of several poetry and prose books including The Minor Odyssey of Lollie Heronfeathers Singer, and Love in a Canoe, Fire and Ashes, and Louis Riel and Gabriel Dumont. Prose works include Death by a Small, Dark Lake, Murder on a Foggy Spring and Granite and Dry Blood. For further information on the Canku, check out his web page at http://home.golden.net/~everson/ or contact him at lennypoetn@yahoo.com.

Gwen Austin, retired therapeutic recreation specialist, lives and writes in Washington State in a woodsy spot near Mt. Rainier. Her first book of poetry, Through a Dusty Lens, is about a year in Vietnam. Gwen is also the author of two novels, Twilight Manor and Fateful Days. Currently, Gwen is co-facilitator for the Senior Poets Workshop at the on-line Writers' University Village. She also co-facilitates two advanced poetry courses at WVU.

Christine Bloom is a special educator and mother of two who resides in La Verne, California with her husband. She has been active in the Writers' Village University program for the past two years through the advanced poetry classes. She is a member of the Senior Poetry Workshop. Christine holds a master's degree in the education of learning handicapped children, a counseling credential and several other teaching credentials. Her undergraduate degrees are in History and in English.

Janice Oestermyer received her A.S. from St. Mary-of-the-Woods, near Terre Haute, Indiana in 1984. She also studied poetry at the University of Tennessee at Knoxville and children's writing via the Institute of Children's Literature. She has had several articles on writing poetry published; the first at The Christian Communicator, four articles in T-Zero: The Writer's E-Zine, and one published at Fellowscript, Canada. Her poetry has been widely published and has placed in contests.

Maureen (Mo) Swanson has been teaching in elementary school for nineteen years. She is a member of Word Weavers and Senior Poets Workshop at Writers' Village University.

Glennis Hobbs is a Canadian poet-writer. She has published two other poetry books “The Waldron Wild Cats” and “City on the Rocks” “In and Out of the Shadows,” and most recently “Drums Follow the Sun.” She is currently working on a novel plus three other poetry books as well as a novel. She is a co-facilitator of the Senior Poets Workshop and as well co-facilitates two online poetry courses at Writers’ Village University. She is a contributing editor for T-Zero: The Writer’s E-Zine.

Helen V. Lundt lives in upstate New York. She has worked as a nurse's aide in a nursing home for seven years, then as a nurse in a local hospital for twenty years. She and her husband have traveled many miles by motor home through the United States. Helen started with WVU about three years ago and is a member of the Senior Poets Workshop. She has been published in Coachmen Capers, U.S. Legacies 2004 and 2005, online and in magazine, as well as T-Zero: The Writer's E-Zine.

Lana Wiltshire Campbell is a lawyer, a teacher and a writer with a theater and film background. She's currently working on two chapbooks of poetry and a children's picture book based on one of her poems. She is a member of the Writers' Village University Senior Poets Workshop.