An online
   mini HAIKU
          seminar
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(being an intuitively edited thread of messages from newsgroup
rec.arts.poems)

: ) Here's a pseudohaiku,
: ) please translate it poetically into English:

: )     aki-beya ni
: )    sasayaki-kakeru
: )     kaze hitotsu

: ) (-an empty-room' -in' / -whispering [to me]' / -wind' -one') : ) "There
is a wind, sole, whispering in an empty room"

: aki-beya would actually be closer to "unused room" rather than : empty room
wouldn't it? "unused" or "unoccupied" depending on : whether it's a room in a
building (like my lab) or unoccupied if : it's in an apartment complex.

: in the vacant room
: a lonely zephyr silently
: whispers things at me

: (kakeru would change "whispers to me" to "whispers at me" I believe) :
"silently" is not in the original poem. If anyone can come up with : an extra
2 or 3 syllables that fits the rhythmical pattern but doesn't : add any more
info, please do so.

Maybe I don't like this haiku structure thing after all. I mean...adding
words to a poem just to have more syllables? This is like endstop rhyme and
marching trochais...a misplaced emphasis. Kills the poetry, I think. Or if
so, why 3 lines?

                whispering through my empty room:
                one solitary gust of autumn

Adding syllables that mean nothing occurs very frequently in Japanese haiku.
There have been some poets, notably Santohka, who didn't like it either and
have made some excellent poems which I definitely consider haiku. There are
always debates going on as to whether they really qualify or not.
There doesn't have to be 3 lines in a haiku. That's a Western invention. I
only use 3 lines when (a) the haiku doesn't fit on one line because the page
is too small or (b) I need some kind of break for a scene change or
something.

If the above is modified to "the empty room" it'd be OK too I suppose.
Western rhythm but hey, it's in English now isn't it?

The original translation had a person in it. There's a person in this one. Of
course, there's no arguing with the ref...
whispering
in the empty-room:
the wind

i believe in japanese, the direct or indirect object
of a sentence can be implied by context.  so i wonder what degree of
ambiguity the author desired.

     )-wind' -one'

here i have a little problem.  i thought that japanese was verb final i look
at this and wonder if the sentence didn't end
on the line before and if this line is a type of final comment. it is not
necessarily the wind that is whispering.

     )"There is a wind, sole, whispering in an empty room"

though from this translation it looks like that the author intends for the
wind to do the whispering.  just for the fun of it i may disregard it.

if the room is a specific room, then the room may have been once occupied. 
this could imply some specific loss.  maybe the loss of a loved one or of a
love or of something precious.

whispering                      only the wind
in the (now) empty room.        whispering
only the wind.                  in the (now) empty room.

A sudden wind, and i was being surprised at it.
The situation is : "I was in an empty room, when a wind blew."

As far as I know haiku is *really* supposed to have
"break for... or something". Moreover, in some of them
you can see the 3-stage scheme which I could describe with
help of rather silly but understandible chemical analogy:

"one reagent,
another reagent,
reaction."

You can find such examples by Basho (a pond-)a frog-)a splash) or by Issa (a
snail-)the Fuji slope-)patience).
So, maybe this "Western invention" isn't as stupid as haiku which just
"doesn't fit on one line because the page is too small (!?!)"

    'for knowledge add a little every day
     for wisdom erase a little every day'  Lao Tze