The venerable haiku poem. It's been
around for hundreds of years. Traditionally composed in Japan using
a 5-7-5 arrangement of syllables, western poets have loosened this
form to create what is now considered modern haiku poetry.
The modern version still sounds somewhat similar to the original
but it does not adhere to making the syllables come out to 5-7-5.
This is a good thing! It frees the poet up to explore what is truly
important in haiku writing and that is its spirit!
To write modern haiku poetry one needs to know the
technique behind it and that has everything to do with understanding
fragment and phrase theory for haiku today is composed using this
technique. For example, take a look at this modern haiku poem:
summer mist --
sap trickles
down the pine
Here we have a haiku consisting of a fragment and a phrase. The
fragment "summer mist" gives us a macro view while the phrase "sap
trickles down the pine" shows us a specific detail. To write modern
haiku poetry, you don't really need to know more than this.
Really
