Colin Blundell
Hailstones: edited by Stephen Henry Gill
Hailstones: edited by Stephen Henry Gill; 4X6 inches; ISBN 4-9900822-0-6 £5.50 post paid from Brian Tasker, The Annexe, Blythe House, 65 Nunney Road, Frome, Somerset BS23 4LE
A fruitful way of thinking about any project you care to think of - including the writing of a review - is to consider the intended outcomes: if they are well-formed to start with then the result is likely to exhibit a kind of congruence. Leaving aside some of our cherished beliefs about haiku, this rather beautiful little book amply exemplifies its stated values: haiku should be ‘poetry rather than formula’; SHG’s selection process is based on the principle that to be included a haiku should ‘strike then melt’ into an aftertaste.
The Hailstone Haiku Circle, we learn, has its centre in Kansai, the area of Japan’s ancient capitals, more specifically in a body of friends gathered around SHG’s lecturing work. Just like haiku poems, ‘hail...comes in all shapes and sizes...can fall in any season of the year. The Japanese give it different names according to the season’, thus adding, presumably, to their richness of experience.
| hailstorm … to a mountain village decorated with frescoes Michio Sano This scar? Glass bangles After wild dancing. Valerie Matsumoto |
inn of the citron trees - quite unexpectedly peeping in a long-nosed goblin Midori Inoue the lute sleeps 1000 years deep waiting for my touch Robert MacLean |
What characterises almost all the Hailstones haiku/senryu is their extreme lightness of touch, a ‘strike then melt’ quality.
Page(s) 59-60
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