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a moment is forever by Stanley Pelter, pub. Hub Editions, 2005. ISBN 1-903746-48-5. (Free from Stanley Pelter.)                 

  Behavioural psychologists in the 1950s did research into the degree that students changed their opinions to fit in with a group.(1) Different variables were used and the research demonstrated that when one student’s view was the sole divergent view, her/his opinion changed to conform with the rest of the group the most often. They also researched the concept of cognitive dissonance. (2) It seems that (on a thinking level at least) human beings need consonance.
 

   One way for dissonance to be created is by changing one of our beliefs - it occurs because, by changing one of our beliefs, our other beliefs may be at variance, so we have to go through a process of readjusting all of our beliefs to create consonance.
 
   I have no doubt that ‘a moment is forever’ will cause you cognitive dissonance. It certainly did me. Not only does it challenge generally accepted truisms about haiku, it does so using a different framework to the ones usually used to discuss the subject. All of this, of course, makes it compelling reading. The brain cells wake up when they are being disturbed.
 
   Within the striking front and back covers you will find poignant drawings accompanying haiku; three-word haiku; four and five line haiku; surreal haiku; unhaiku haiku; ‘landwidge and sintax’, and many, what would be considered by most people, conventional haiku.
 
  This book is exploratory and concerned with extending the boundaries of haiku, and with that in mind, I shall comment on what I think does and does not work.
Starting with the three-word haiku: I have seen haiku using this form before, and I do not think they give the reader enough. Of course that does not mean that there are not experiences waiting to be recorded for which it would be totally the appropriate form, but for me that is the key: the experience (content) should dictate the form. Stanley also adheres to this, in theory, but perhaps because of the exploratory nature of this book, I am not sure he always adheres to it in practice. Stanley wants us to think outside the box, but even this view is a fossilised one which could be re-examined. My fossil dates back to my training in media but we are now in a  post-modern world. Where Stanley and I differ, is that the concept of content dictating form is, for me, inextricably linked to the idea of the observer repressing their thoughts in order to ‘hear’ the observee. From my reading of Stanley’s introduction, I have no doubt that he will see that last statement as a human impossibility. He says, “You simply cannot know or learn about a pine, a bamboo, a bat or anything from a pine, a bamboo, a bat or anything”. But I believe, as Hegel did, that there is such a thing as objective subjectivity, and that is what haiku poets should aim for. Of course, if you are not writing haiku from actuality then the above does not apply.
The one haiku from the three-word section that did work for me is:   

                                                                          night     
                                                                          sea
                                                                          still

Here is a five-line haiku from the section headed ‘war’.

                                                          cannot find them
                                                          not a single one
                                                          who survived the bombs
                                                          to again walk these streets
                                                          where once we played

Below are haiku from other sections of the book:

death:  even                                          funerals: moonlight
           her  handKerchief                                   on her body
           cries                                                       she who loved sun
 
wind:    wild garlic                     surreal:  a rook sleeps with her
             bends into the sounds                slowly he tears at his watch
             of unseen wind                          until tears appear

Stanley uses irony extremely effectively.

 all she could think of                          funeral
 shuffling to the gas chamber               not the same
 ‘beam me up scottie’                         without her

What I think works less well, and I have seen other haiku poets use word play, is:
                                          aunt cremated
                                          family row
                                          flares

  This is more like a corny joke. I am not a hundred per cent sure of why I am prejudiced against word play in haiku and senryu - but I am. It gets in the way somehow, and often disguises a lack of substance.
 
   There is also a section in the book devoted to the conscious use of cliché. A device used to decliché the cliché, and in so doing to ‘invigorate’ it. Stanley acknowledges that it may also be used, in the right context, in its simple role. On the whole, these do not work for me either, but:

                                     nothing
                                     but shadows
                                     alive and kicking

  From a general poetry view, I think what Stanley is saying is pertinent and important. But, I have the same problem with some of what Stanley says and those who want us to move more towards conventional poetry from different perspectives. The problem is that the writer does too much work for the reader.

  I came to haiku from a love of radio, where I was taught that a radio talk is like a Japanese print: you must always leave space for the listener to participate. And that is what I liked about haiku. Complex haiku, which Stanley advocates, mean that the reader has to try to understand all the things the writer is doing, which is not the same as being part of the creation process.

  Stanley is putting forward a point of view as valid as anyone else’s. There are a number of reasons why people may resist what he says. They may agree with some aspects of his perspective, perhaps those that cause them little or no dissonance; writing may not be their sole reason for writing haiku - they may see it as part of a spiritual process, or even, primarily, as a way to document experiences they have in daily living. It may also be that, whether consciously or unconsciously, some people are on a development path of a different nature to Stanley’s and want to follow through with that.
 
    I would say that by reading this book Stanley has loosened a few of my own fossils, but none has been dislodged. But, then, in the past I did not like haiku with a ‘hinge’ line - and I have written six in the past year quite unconsciously, which is the way I like things to happen. Change is a slow process and research shows that people tend to read what reinforces their existing views. For this reason and many more, I would encourage you to acquire a copy of this book.