Category: Haiku-a-day 2017

A living performance art, this is my forth year of creating a haiku-a-day. By the end of this year I’ll have 1,458 short Japanese poems online (getting close as I update this today, on 12/16/17). I believe I’ve only missed 2 days in four years…where’s Waldo?!? I’m doing mostly haiku now, but every now and then a tanka comes into form.

This has been a most excellent way for me to keep my hand in poetry as I worked on my novel, The Iliad of Isis, for the past four years. The third draft manuscript is polished, I’m seeking an agent, and hope to get it published soon, as it dives deeply into rape culture and adds much to the very hot current conversation.

Inspired by writer Nicole Galland who founded The Haiku Room (a closed Facebook group*) on January 1, 2014, and tens of other writers therein, I committed to a year in 2014. A couple of us have kept going to the present. Not always easy, but I learned from another in the “room” that when you get blocked, just lower your standards. It gets you through the block and good stuff always returns. Thus you may occasionally find some substandard work, but the practice has brought many gems to life that wouldn’t have otherwise lived.

The first year culminated in an anthology, Everyday Haiku, edited by Kristen Ringman, of which I am honored to be a part. https://www.amazon.com/Everyday-Haiku-anthology-Kristen-Ringman-ebook/dp/B071J74KGJ/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1513447409&sr=8-2&keywords=everyday+haiku

*A big thank-you to one of my favorite authors, Janet Fitch, for adding me.