Dear Members,
It has been a landmark year for Australian haiku and I would like to take this opportunity to thank all poets for their contributions, cooperation and friendship throughout the year.
There were many highlights this year including the launch of the under the same moon: Fourth Australian Haiku Anthology. This anthology is a major milestone for Australian haiku and has been warmly received both here and abroad. We also celebrated the announcement of the winners in the second John Bird Dreaming Award for Haiku. This award is now recognised as a credible international competition and it was my pleasure to nominate the winning poems for consideration in the 2023 Touchstone Awards .
The Australian Haiku Society has enjoyed another busy year, which has seen the number of subscribers grow to over 1000 for the first time. The AHS website, the flagship for the AHS, had 34,000 page views, with most interest coming from Australia, The United States and India. Once again, the AHS hosted several events across the year to promote haiku in Australia, including a national online reading for the anthology as well as the popular solstice haiku strings and kukais, which always create a lot of interest and generate quality poems. We look forward to holding more events next year, as they are an excellent opportunity for haiku poets across the country to come together to share haiku and consolidate connections. As always, we were kept up to speed on the various happenings of all the haiku groups around the country due to the diligent efforts of group leaders who continued to post reports of their meetings on the website.
It has been a memorable year and I thank you all for your support. I wish you all a happy and safe new year and look forward to further haiku adventures in 2024.
Yours in Haiku,
Rob Scott.
President, AHS.
Australian Haiku Society 