Author: Lynette Arden

Cloudcatcher Ginko #40

Ginko 40 inaugural members
Back: Nathalie Buckland, Helen Davison, Sharon Dean. Front: Max Ryan,Quendryth Young. Photographed by Jacqui Murray, 4 February 2016 .Cloudcatchers attending Ginko #40, who were present at the inaugural ginko in 2005

 

Ginko #40

Torakina Park, Brunswick Heads NSW
Thursday 4 February 2016

The tenth anniversary of the inaugural meeting of the Cloudcatcher haiku group was celebrated at the very same picnic table where the original gathering took place on 5 December 2005. Torakina Park, in Brunswick Heads, where the Brunswick River meets the sea, has been a favourite site for ginko, and this was the fourteenth assemblage there by the group. Janice Bostok, known as the haiku pioneer of Australia, was with us at that first meeting (as she was also at a number of subsequent ginko), inspiring participants with her astute comments and some impromptu haiku of her own.

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Further haiku response from Jo McInerney – THF’s ‘re: Virals 21’

In the latest weekly posting of the ‘re:Virals’ segment on The Haiku Foundation’s website, Australian haiku poet Jo McInerney features once again, this time through her response to the following haiku:

dry wheat grass . . .
the whiteness of
a child dying

— Robert D. Wilson, ‘A Lousy Mirror’ (2011)

As well as being reproduced here in full, below, Jo’s response can be accessed at the following link:

http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/2016/02/05/revirals-21/

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Australian poets featured in Shamrock No. 33

Australian poet Simon Hanson has had one of his poems voted as the best haiku for the year in the Shamrock Haiku Journal Readers’ Choice Awards 2015, as just published online in Shamrock No. 33 –

window ice
the garden thaws
in sparkles

– Simon Hanson

Full details about the 2015 Shamrock Readers’ Choice Awards can be accessed through the Shamrock website:

http://shamrockhaiku.webs.com/currentissue.htm

The work of a range of other Australian haiku poets has likewise been recognised in Shamrock No. 33, especially within the IHS International Haiku Competition Results 2015, as found below, but also through this link:

http://irishhaiku.webs.com/haikucompetition.htm

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Submissions open to the Living Haiku Anthology

Australian haiku poets are strongly encouraged to submit work towards the Living Haiku Anthology.

This is being compiled by Don Baird, Richard Gilbert and Hansha Teki.

It could become the largest international online repository of haiku.

The editors are seeking to include haiku from poets worldwide.

Representation is open to any poet who has a group of previously published haiku.

Full submission details can be found at this website:

http://livinghaikuanthology.com/

Australian poets featured in Shamrock No. 33

Australian poet Simon Hanson has had one of his poems voted as the best haiku for the year in the Shamrock Haiku Journal Readers’ Choice Awards 2015, as just published online in Shamrock No. 33 –

window ice
the garden thaws
in sparkles

– Simon Hanson

Full details about the 2015 Shamrock Readers’ Choice Awards can be accessed through the Shamrock website:

http://shamrockhaiku.webs.com/currentissue.htm

The work of a range of other Australian haiku poets has likewise been recognised in Shamrock No. 33, especially within the IHS International Haiku Competition Results 2015, as found below, but also through this link:

http://irishhaiku.webs.com/haikucompetition.htm

Presented in alphabetical order, the following poems by Australian haiku poets gained Honourable Mentions in last year’s Irish Haiku Society haiku contest, as recently published in Shamrock Haiku Journal No. 33:

thunderheads
a cowrie’s mantle
purple-flushed

– Marietta McGregor

empty ocean
the shearwater’s belly
catches the sun

– Greg Piko

winter’s afternoon
a golden pheasant weaves
through bamboo

– Cynthia Rowe

sunset valley
a line of merinos
melds into the gold

– Barbara A. Taylor

Bindii February Meeting

Ten Bindii members met at The Box Factory for a workshop by Julia Wakefield on ‘What Makes a Good Haiku’. Julia presented a thoroughly researched workshop, looking at examples of haiku that have been critically acclaimed, and members discussed what made them ‘good haiku’. Julia focused not only on three-line haiku, but had plentiful examples of one-line haiku and also some four-line haiku. It was interesting for members to discuss the impact of the format of these haiku and why the author had chosen that particular format, instead of sticking to the more usual three line.

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Australian haiku poets featured in January edition of ‘cattails’

A range of Australian haiku poets have been included in the latest edition of the ‘cattails’ haiku journal (from the UHTS), including the following three, whose work has been featured among the Editor’s Choices:

only the moon
privy to a possum’s
tightrope walk

– Madhuri Pillai

outer suburb
the length of a dog’s
weekday voice

– Jan Dobb

first spring day
birdsong unravels
my knitting

– Hazel Hall

The Editor’s commentary accompanying these three haiku can be accessed through the following link, as can the text for Marietta McGregor’s haibun ‘The Ten Millennium Tree’, winner of second prize in the UHTS haibun contest:

http://www.unitedhaikuandtankasociety.com/

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