Spring Into Haiku

what is this Haiku

but a snip of a moment

seen and written down

For three hundred years Haiku has been part of daily life in Japanese culture. People from Japan believe that the way to learn about big things is often by slowing down to see the small things in life.

Haiku is three simple lines. Haiku is the world’s shortest poetry, as short as one breath. In Japan and all over the world, it is the most popular form today. It is something noticed; a connection to nature. Haiku is sound and movement and color and scent. Often Haiku celebrates the seasons. Haiku is a way of looking at the world around you and capturing beautiful moments.

oh, bumblebee, oh

how I love the way that you

rest on the flowers

~Arin (age 11)

Teachers might say that Haiku is seventeen syllables and this is the way that most people understand the form. Usually the first line has five syllables, the second line has seven, and the last line has five syllables as in the examples above. It is fun to write Haiku with seventeen syllables.

Here is a famous seventeen-syllable Haiku written by American poet, Patricia Machmiller:

and now the cat comes

in the moonlight his shadow

darker than himself

Sometimes it is also fun to just try three short lines that capture what you see.

Stop reading for a moment and look outside. What do you see? As winter melts away and spring rolls out its carpet, how is your yard or city or playground changing? Open a window. What do you hear? What scents swirl on the breeze? Can you write three lines describing what you see?

The very best Haiku book we’ve found is called Haiku, Asian Arts and Crafts for Creative Kids by Patricia Donegan. In this book the author explains the “seven keys to writing Haiku” with examples by both kids and adults. There are beautiful traditional and contemporary crafts to try as well as a chapter about Japanese brush paintings or “Haiga” which combines Haiku with a drawing.