As all regular readers here know, a hokku is a sensory event set in the context of a particular season. That is basic knowledge. But did you ever ask yourself why? What, after all, is the point of recording sensory, season-related events as hokku?
This matter is very significant in getting to the root of what hokku is all about, yet it is very simple. Hokku have to do with the creation of very subtle states of mind in the reader. The operative word here is subtle. That is why hokku are not “war” verses, not “romance” verses, not “protest” verses, not “social commentary” verses. And it is also why hokku has a deep connection with a meditative life, such as one finds in (traditional) Zen or Ch’an Buddhism, as well as with the kind of attitude toward life found in Transcendentalism, as in the writings of Henry David Thoreau.
Now what do we mean by “subtle states of mind”? You already know. You have just perhaps never heard it put that way before.
Here is an example. When you read the words in this title of the old classic children’s book, they automatically create a “subtle state of mind” that you may not have consciously noticed, but were aware of nonetheless — subtly aware:
The Wind in the Willows
Just those words, with nothing added, arouse a certain nearly-indefinable sensation in us. We see the willows, we see the wind blowing through the branches, and we may even feel the wind against our arms or faces. But beyond that, there is a distinct, definite feeling created in our minds — a “subtle state of mind” that is aroused by the willows and the wind in them.
We can modulate that effect — change it — by putting it in the context of a season. Look how different the “subtle sensations” are that doing so creates:
Spring — the wind in the willows
Summer — the wind in the willows.
Autumn — the wind in the willows.
Winter — the wind in the willows.
What a contrast between the fresh wind of spring through the young leaves, and the cold, biting wind of winter through the bare branches!
To appreciate such verse, one must be able to appreciate simple, understated things. There is nothing grand here. Hokku does not strive to be beautiful or conventionally poetic. It merely records a sensory event in the context of a season, and that creates its own “poetry” in the mind of the reader.
In modern hokku we do not write the actual season name into every verse. But we do label every verse with the season, so we know its context, and that enables us to experience it.
Of course in the “wind in the willows” examples, I have not put them in the form of a hokku, but we can see the relationship between those examples and real hokku if we look, for example, at this verse by Ryūshi:
Stillness;
The sound of a bird
Walking on fallen leaves.
In old Japan that would have been a “winter” verse; but it could also be an autumn verse, depending on how we label it, and there would be a difference in feeling between the two, as we see if we add the season “label” to each:
(Autumn)
Stillness;
The sound of a bird
Walking on fallen leaves
(Winter)
Stillness;
The sound of a bird
Walking on fallen leaves.
Just by changing the season, we make it a different hokku, a different verse. Yes, the words are still precisely the same, but the seasonal context makes a significant change in the subtle state of mind evoked. It is not that one is “better” than the other, but rather that each has its own effect.
That is what hokku does. It creates subtle states of mind in the reader by recording a sensory (sight, sound, smell, taste, touch) event in its seasonal context. And that is the “poetry” of hokku — not in the words, but as it appears in the mind of the reader. For that to happen, however, and to have its full effect, the reader must be the kind of person who is open and appreciative of such subtle states of mind.
That is one reason why, as I often say, hokku is not for everyone because everyone is not for hokku.
David
HOKKU 