f/k/a archives . . . real opinions & real haiku

When one of my best friends showed an interest in haiku

two years ago, I tried to figure out how to best nurture that

interest.  Because she rarely gets online, I needed something

on paper, and the answer seemed clear: lend her my copy

of The Haiku Anthology: Haiku and Senryu in English, 3rd Ed.

(W.W. Norton Press, edited by Cor van den Heuvel, 1999).

With 850 poems by 89 of the finest past and present English-

language haiku poets, and introductory essays on the evolution

of the genre in English, THA was the perfect choice.  It’s pre-

decessor, the 2nd edition, was my initial introduction to the

genre and the poets. 

 

the haiku anthology

 

I’ve missed having The Haiku Antholgy within arms’ reach,

and have been wanting to ask for it back.  Thus, it was a

pleasant surprise when friend Cyndi handed it to me as I

was leaving her home last weekend, while she reassured me 

that she now has a good supply of her own haiku volumes

by her bedside. 

 

It took only a few minutes to see why I had missed this

volume.  Opening to any page, landed me among old friends

and their “offspring.”   For example, the first poems to come

to my attention by our Honored Guest Tom Clausen are there,

including:

 

 

farm country back road:

just like them i lift one finger

from the steering wheel

 

 

 

         daybreak–

from the bread truck’s roof

         frost swirls

 

 

 

 

the plumber

kneeling in our tub

— talking to himself

 

 

Seeing Tom’s “old” work, made me want to

check out some of his new offerings and share

them with you:

 

redwing blackbird calls 

—the dog tugs for

another scent

 

 

 

relatives set to visit

so many cobwebs

to remove

 

 

 

 

 

 

the river

full of ice

broken free

 

 

Tom Clausen
“farm country” – Modern Haiku XXVI:1 (1994)
“daybreak” – Unraked Leaves (1995)
“the plumber” – Modern Haiku XXIX:1 (1998)
“redwing blackbird calls” – The Heron’s Nest

“redwing blackbird calls” – The Heron’s Nest (Dec. 2005)
“relatives” & “the river” – Upstate Dim Sum  (2005/II)

 

  p.s. to Cor:  We’d love to see THA IV!

  Speaking about encouraging friends, I’ve been  

wondering whether anyone else has the same mixed

reaction that I do, when one lawyer automatically con-

gratulates another regarding a litigation victory.  It

happens all the time within law firms or agencies, or

any connected group of lawyers.   Being a solo and a

retiree, I don’t have to do or witness this custom in person

any more.  But, I see it occasionally online — such as at

Crime & Federalism today, when Mike Cernovich had a

short post saying:

 

                                                                        

“Co-bloggger Norm Pattis just got a not guilty on 

all counts for a client charged with three counts

of custodial interference.  Great job, Norm!”

Not knowing the facts, procedure, or law of the particular

case, the lawyer-Yabut and the citizen in me want to ask

things like: (1) was justice really served?  (2) was it an

easy case to win because the prosecutor did a terrible job?

(3) was the victory “a great job” because it took a very slick 

lawyer to create a reasonable doubt, when the facts suggested

the defendant had actually done the acts charged? 

Reading these questions, I can see

that I’m showing my doubts about the lawyer’s

role in our very imperfect adversary system.

If a lawyer friend or partner represented landlords and evicted

widows and children frequently, would I congratulate him or

her on a court victory, regardless of the facts?  If a nonlawyer

significant-other ran the State’s gas chamber, would I congra-

tulate her on a good execution? 

 

“questionDudeS”

 

Admittedly, I have always been somewhat sparing with my

compliments.  If you get one from me, it is sincere.  I hope

Mike Cernovich and other readers will weigh in on this issue.

Is Mike just giving Norm a little free (search-engine-friendly)

publicity that Norm is too modest to post?   Does he know

the particular case well and is truly pleased at the outcome

as a seeker of justice and fairness?  Or is every lawyer victory

worthy of congratulations from his friends and associates?

                                                                             the haiku anthology 

 

 

Yesterday, I asked professor–poet–author–translator David Lanoue if he would share his reactions to returning to New Orleans with us. Here, unedited, is his reply, including a few haiku/senryu on the subject:

from David Lanoue, Feb. 15, 2006:

her pen dries up
she blames
Katrina

New Orleans is a tale of two cities. I live Uptown, which didn’t flood

seriously for the most part and is now a thriving area. The main signs of
Katrina are the absence of the St. Charles streetcar (expected to be back in
service by this December), the absense of many trees (the shady avenue isn’t
as shady as it once was), and the presence of legions of Mexicans pounding
on rooftops and hauling trash. I’m getting plenty of practice speaking
Spanish.

after the hurricane 
the shady avenue
isn’t

count myself very, very lucky. I have friends and colleagues who lost jobs
possessions, and homes.

trashed, molding, unlivable. I have friends living in FEMA trailers and holing up in the upstairs rooms of houses with gutted first floors. The feeling in those neighborhoods is depressing, desolate. And the looting continues.

One of my friends was all set to move into her new FEMA trailer yesterday, when she discovered that someone had stolen the electric meter (with no neighbors around, it’s hard for the first returners to get a foothold). But she’s happy to “have” a trailer. Months ago, one was put in her yard by a FEMA contractor, and the trailor was stolen before she ever saw it. (Or, the contractor lied about delivering it; you decide who to believe.)

the city recovers
restaurant
by restaurant

The most hopeful sign of life and rebuilding is the return of the university students: to Tulane, Xavier (where I teach), Loyola, SUNO… With their return–blessed legions of kids with backpacks on bicycles–more restaurants are reopening; more coffee houses are extending their hours. The students are consumers and they supply the workforce of waiters and dish washers (which, by the way, is a high-paying job these days, given the labor shortage).

Everyone’s hoping for a monumental Mardi Gras. Having lived here 25 years,
I’d grown jaded to Carnival in recent years, seizing the opportunity of days
off to travel elsewhere. This year’s different. I plan to attend every parade; to party in the French Quarter till dawn; to shake the hands of, or plant a kiss on, every out-of-towner I can grab. The City of New Orleans is open for business. Come on down!

blown away by the hurricane
every stripper
I knew

– all poems by David G. Lanoue

  His coverage of Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath in New Orleans has made Ernie the Attorney Svenson and his weblog even more renown. Here’s my plea to David Lanoue to put up a weblog and regularly share his thoughts and poetry on the rebirth of New Orleans with his friends and fans in the haijin community.

The f/k/a gang isn’t going to take all the credit, but we’d like to

thing we helped bring about a major improvement in legal ethics

weblogging that occurred today: the return of Ben Cowgill to active

status, at his renamed ‘Ben Cowgill on Legal Ethics‘ website.

 

When Ben launched his Legal Ethics Blog last March, we said:

“The weblog itself shows a love of writing and reflection,

along with legal ethics, that will bring me back frequently.”

When the (knuckleheads at the) Kentucky Lawyer Advertising

Commission virtually closed Ben’s weblog down, by asserting that

every blawg post is an ad (June 20, 2005), we led the charge rallying

to his support.  But, that investigation apparently kept Ben from any

substantive posting for more than half of a year.

 

“lost!G”

 

We’ve missed Ben’s updates and insights.  Today, however, Ben Cowgill’s

weblog came roaring back to life, with five posts, including:  

One praising Will Hornsby‘s “ ‘Will Hornsby on the Boundaries of Legal Marketing'”>exceptional ethics site on legal marketing;”

One explaining that the Colorado Consumer Protection Act applies to lawyers,

under a recent opinion by its highest court.

   Another showing the common concerns of disciplinary lawyers on both sides

of the aisle (examples: applying the rules to under-staffed public defender offices

and to overzealous prosecutors)

thought-provoking comments on case citations, competence and computers

What did f/k/a do to assist this auspicious event?  Three weeks ago,

in a post called speak bocce?, we set out English-to-Bocce transla-

tions that we thought might be particularly useful for several of our

weblogging colleagues. Here’s one of them:

for Ben Cowgill at BC’s Legal Ethics   

Can you send a pilot to guide me in?

Mil weez joto ne dimiix?

That’s about as close to a prayer we get around here, and it seems

to have worked.  Ben’s back and we’re happy.  Get over there and see

why.

• 
  
  To whoever it is up in Star Wars Heaven, who
  
  
  heard our plea for Ben’s return, we say:
  
  

  
  

  “Ker pazet on bpnip Holonot.”

  
  

   

  
  

  [“The payment is in the HoloNet.]

 

Kobayashi Issa celebrated many kinds of

returns with his haiku (click here for more):

 

 

flitting butterfly
to Buddha’s lap
returns

 

 

my dog returns
to the dragonfly…
field of flowers

 

 

the lover cat
with a shameless face
has returned

 

 

 

to the world of man
the moon deigns
to return

 

 

 

the hawk returns
to the goblin village…
with a nest-warming bird

 

 

 

up to today
such perserverance and strength!
returning geese

 

   Issa, translated by David G. Lanoue
                                                                                                               “phantomMask”

Taking advantage of his “Katrina sabbatical” from teaching at Xavier U.

of New Orleans, David G. Lanoue, famed translator of Kobayashi Issa, and

author of Haiku Guy, has just completed a new haiku novel, Haiku Wars.

It’s a humorous look at the politics and rivalries in the world haiku community

(which are surely a lot lke the politics and rivalries in most literary and prof-

essional organizations and movements).

Lanoue says:

Haiku Wars is a light-hearted romp through the world of haiku

written by someone (me!) who knows the subject, the players,

and even where some of the skeletons lie buried. But the tone

is never mean, I hope. This novel is my love letter to haiku people

everywhere, even those I may seem to be making fun of (but again,

any resemblance to real persons is purely coincidental)”.

It received a glowing review by Robert Wilson, editor of Simply Haiku, in

the brand new edition of that online journal (Vol. 4:1, Spring 2006). Wilson

explains the storyline:

“An American professor in Louisiana with the help of a reincarnated

bodhisatva dwelling in the body of a pet ferret, put together a haiku

conference for the National Haiku Society. The haiku leaders that

assemble resemble, in many ways, luminaries who populate similar

conferences in real life.”

Wilson opines: “The book is a hoot to read and nearly impossible to put down.

It’s interspersed with haiku and senryu, some written by Issa, and others penned

by Lanoue. The storyline is nicely developed, the dialogue second to none, and I

was kept guessing throughout my reading of the book as to who is who or if there

is a who.”

Haiku Guy

Here are two poems by David Lanoue, from Haiku Wars:

war monument
the tower of cellos
collapses

silent night, holy night
three
at a bar

Laughing Buddha

Readers of this website know that I’m a big fan of David Lanoue’s prior haiku

novels: Haiku Guy (2000; our mini-review) and Laughing Buddha (2004) [both

from Red Moon Press];and Dewdrop World (online for free, 2005), which I feel

have universal appeal.  Haiku Wars may be a little more “inside the haijin com-

munity,” but I’m betting it’s well worth the $15 price for the special, initial 100-

copy run (which includes shipping and an inscribed author’s signature). Click here

for details.

Learning about the genre’s wars, gave a whole new meaning to a link on my Referer/ 

Keywords statistics page this morning.  Someone Googled dangers of haiku>.

The first result was to a travel page about the Hawaiian island of Haiku (no dangers

listed).  The next result, out of 92,300, was to Jim Kacian’s Haiku How-to Primer, here

at f/k/a, where Jim discusses “the greatest dangers to writing good haiku.”

Other results refer to:

“the dangers of further tightening haiku’s already tight form ” (here)

“the dangers of “-ing” in haiku” (here) and

“One of the dangers with haiku is, as Shiki pointed out in his time
(turn of the century) that by its short form, the many haiku written,

and the limited allowed vocabulary, that no one will be able to write

a truly ‘new’ haiku.” (here)

I don’t know what the Google querist had in mind.  After reading about Haiku

Wars, however, I’m starting to worry that intellectual and egoistical battles

over the philosophy and politics of haiku might indeed be dangerous to the

health and welfare of conference goers.  (and see possible danger for

plagiarists and their enablers)  Let’s hope cooler heads and hearts will

prevail, even while we nurture our passion for haiku and within haiku.

“tinyredcheck”  Like the many contributors to the new ukku spring haiku

weblog, I’m confident that David Lanoue is feeling the first

stirrings of Spring and spring fever, now that he is back

in New Orleans.   Here are a few poems with that feel:

this butterfly

has places to go

spring journey

busy little buggers

the flower-mad

butterflies

it’s good

to be a horse

the sweet mountain meadow

growing north, east

then south

mountain pine

in full battle make-up

she rollerblades

by

David G. Lanoue

from Dewdrop World (2005) (online for free)

Intellectual property lawyer and lecturer Paul Rapp (of Albany, NY  

and Housatonic, Mass.) writes a column for the NY Capital Region’s

“alternative newspaper weekly,” Metroland.  This week’s column

“You’ll Never Walk Alone,” (Feb. 16, 2006) describes how the com-

bination of data collection and trading by websites and companies

online and “unrstrained governmental snooping,” leaves us with

“Orwell on steriods.”

“Sort of like a virtual Nixon/J. Edgar Hoover tag-team

assault on your most fundamental civil liberties.”

Paul notes that “the world has changed so quickly that these incredible

events flew by while we weren’t looking.”  He ends: “Maybe it’s time to

start paying attention.”   He’s right, of course.  Most of us weblog denizens

know all this stuff, but perhaps we take the invasion of privacy a bit to

much for granted.  We need to start letting our desire for privacy known to

our legislators — loud and clear.  And, we need to make sure that our less-

computer oriented and tech-savvy friends, clients, and acquaintances are

alerted to these problems and provoked into action.

Jonathan at plagiarism today takes a long look today at Fair Use

and short works (like haiku or weblog blurbs).  An avid crusader for the rights

of copyright holders, Jonathan nonetheless concludes (and I hope this is Fair

Use of his essay):

“Truth be told, there’s nothing wrong with fair use. If done right,

it benefits society and detracts very little, if any, from the copy-

right holder. In fact, it can even promote the original creator.

“Still, those who are uncomfortable with others reusing their work

need to take notice. Fair use applies to short works as well as long

ones.  . . .

“For those wanting to reuse another’s work, just bear in mind that

context is king and that, so long as you take only what is necessary,

taking all of a shorter piece can be just as protected as taking only

a portion of a long one.”

Your input on his conclusions (based is large part on my own) would be much

appreciated.

“lanoueSelf”

Today, Feb. 15, 2006, is your last chance to Comment to the Ohio

Supreme Court on the totally revamped Proposed Rules of the Court’s 

ethics Task Force.

 

 

Find your Editor’s Comments here. You can use email to make your

own submission; the instructions can be found in the Supreme Court’s

Request for Comments, with Comments sent to Richard A. Dove at

profconduct@sconet.state.oh.us>

 

Our prior post, and Comments, discussed two issues that most interested

us:

A) Should lawyers be allowed to characterize their fees

or rates in ads as “discount,” “cut-rate,” “lowest,” or “special,”

when the terms are not used in a false of misleading fashion? 

[Proposed Rules 7.1 to 7.3; current rule DR 2-101(A)(5)] 

 

(B) Should lawyers be required (for matters above $500) to com-

municate in writing with a client concerning the scope of en-

gagement and the basis or rate of fees and expenses?

[Proposed Rules 1.2(c) and 1.5(b)]

We answer both questions in the affirmative.  Please

join in our effort to give informed consumers the benefits of competition 

and innovation.