The Heron's Nest

Editors' Choices

The Heron's Nest Award

In haiku, we look for — expect is perhaps too strong a word these days in English-language haiku — certain features. There is the kigo, establishing both the seasonal setting of the poem and the poet's identification with centuries of tradition. We also look for some version of the kireji, usually represented in our haiku by punctuation or a line break that indicates a clear pause or even a full stop.

Neither of these features are prominent in the poem we have selected for this issue's Heron's Nest Award. One can say there is a soft break at the end of line one, where a comma would not be out of place. And even a second soft break after the word "barn" in line two. And, while a reader can easily provide a season in imaging a barn being taken down, a kigo is a formally agreed upon word or phrase associated with a single season, primarily through its use in renga/renku.

Despite all that, this was very clearly our top selection for June. Why?

English-language haiku has one foot in the received traditions of the genre and another foot in traditions of English prosody. As a result, there are expectations of our haiku that have little or no relation to haiku before the twentieth century. Instead of a kigo, it has been suggested that haiku might feature a "key word." This seems to have come about as a byproduct of international practice, where kigo are less universally applicable; Christmas, for instance, being an early winter event in the northern hemisphere and an early summer event in the southern hemisphere. The concept of "key word" does not have the depth of tradition associated with kigo but, if it invokes an image widely recognizable among English-speakers, it at least offers the chance of developing a body of tradition over time. In Peter Newton's poem, "barn" and "sky" are effectively "key words"

My personal practice, as a reader of English-language haiku, also involves looking for two other kinds of words. One is what I call "weight-bearing words," by which I mean words that feel like the indispensable ingredients, without which the poem would not work, or not work as well as it does. This poem is rich in such words. The main examples would be "beam" and "sky." The ability of "beam" to function as both wood and sunlight is detonated by "sky." If the last line was "to earth" or "to the ground," either of which would preserve the literal image, we would not be as certain that the poet is also inviting us to contemplate beams of light as part of the poetic architecture.

Another thing I look for is what I call "orbit words." These are words that do not appear in the poem but somehow spring to mind as relevant. Of course, this is a subjective phenomenon and there is no reason to expect anything like unanimity among readers. For me, there are several prominent examples here. One involves the homophonic "raise" and "raze." Another is "shadow." And, closely related to that, "eclipse." There are no beams of light on a cloudless day. They require framing. In this poem, the relationship of beams of wood to beams of light is a creative one. As the beams of wood are removed, there are fewer and finally no beams of light.

Tone is also an important element of haiku, though one that resists any precise definition. This poem is not about the demolition of a barn, leaving a scrap pile of debris. This barn is being taken down beam by beam. The beams are valued, salvaged. The barn is being deconstructed. The process is respectful, which is a good tone for haiku.

Finally, I consider it an effective haiku strategy to have the strong elements of alliteration located in the first parts of the poem and to end with a word, like "sky," that surprises us subtly, with a new sound.

These are the reasons Peter Newton's poem got my vote.

John Stevenson
June 2023