This week: Haiku Master Jane Reichhold Edited by: eyestar~*  
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 Hiya readers! I am happy to be a guest editor. I love haiku and am always learning more about this short form. This week I want to share a short bio of the passionate haiku poet, Jane Reichhold, who loved the form and was influential in teaching and expanding the awareness of its magic!
In her own words:
"As with all philosophical truths, the more one learns about haiku, and the two forms from which it evolved—tanka and renga, the more one realizes that Oriental poetry has a great deal to show us about using images, manipulating poetic devices, and viewing the world around us. Most people feel they 'learned all about haiku' in grade school, but writing my book gave me the opportunity to show what they were not taught and why."
"What we need to experience is how to go into each day excited by the possibilities it holds, to be aware of the majesty of our universe even as it settles as specks of dust on the table, to be open to the flashes of inspiration, and to be able to write down these feelings in a succinct fashion. This richness of life, living, and joy is available to every person in any situation. Nothing is more sacred than a mind bent to beauty, majesty, and awe. And that is where haiku is."
Jane Reichhold
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| ASIN: 197380364X |
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Amazon's Price: $ 15.99
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As a student of Haiku, I learned a lot from Jane Reichhold's work and teachings. Her book was one I first used and discovered that the haiku format that I learned in school was not the whole story! Her knowledge, experience and encouragement of writers of these Japanese forms is extensive and inspiring.
My favourite one is Writing and Enjoying Haiku: A Hands-on Guide
Another best seller that I have yet to read is Basho,The Complete Haiku.
like your scars
known by my fingers
your name
getting lost
in apple blossoms
applause
dreams
the tightrope we walk
without a net
music
in the grass
lovers
 Jane Reichhold (1937-2016} born in Lima, Ohio was an amazing creator and contributed so much in her lifetime. She studied Art and Journalism, taught art to children, once owned a pottery workshop studio, created rope sculptures that were exhibited in Europe and wrote free-lance articles and poetry. She was married, raised three children and with her second husband, Werner Reichhold, she co-edited Lynx for Linking Poets from 1992 through 2013. She began a website in 1995. From 2006 to 2016 she maintained an online forum – the AHA Poetry forum. It is still online today as archives of her work.
She began writing in 1963 and publishing haiku books in 1979. She was the Leader of the Haiku Writers of Gualala Arts and publisher Haiku Sharing for seven years, as well as the founder of AHA Books, Publishing Company, in 1987.
She was a member of the Haiku International, Haiku Society of America, Haiku Canada, German Haiku Society, Poetry Society of Japan, Haiku Poets of Northern California.
 In her lifetime Jane published 40 books about haiku, renga and tanka and translated 7 books from the Japanese and twice won the Museum of Haiku Literature Award (Tokyo) and three times won the Haiku Society of America's Merit Book Award. She was honoured by the Emperor and Empress of Japan with an invitation to the Imperial Poetry Party at New Year's at the Palace in 1998.
Three of her award winning books are
Tigers in Teacup,
Silence, and
A Dictionary of Haiku.
 According to Sandra Simpson, she was a generous poet who deliberately didn’t copyright any of her uplifting haiku work so it could be shared freely for the world to be a better place.
caught in a grape leaf
enough raindrops to water
a sparrow
 Jane made her lesson plans freely available as the Bare Bones School of Haiku, Bare Bones School of Renga and Wind Five-Folded School of Tanka.
Jane was a passionate artist working with clay and a pen.
In the 1960's she lived in Dinuba, Ca and went on a trip to get more clay for her pottery work. she stopped at a bookstore and found a book on Haiku...and fell in love! She began to write in the 5-7-5 method and began a life long study. In 1970, she divorced and moved to Germany to marry a fellow poet, W. Reichhold.
She met Sabrina Sommerkamp, who was doing a doctorate on haiku and they went on to discover more about the form and the Haiku world in Hamburg. In the 1980's she related:
“I realized what I had been writing was not good or real haiku. As I read everything I could find about it, my poetry began to change. I wrote shorter haiku, no longer with a specific syllable count;"
 Later on, she spent much time in her woods in California and with the Hamburg community, she lived Haiku and even had the list of rules written out to check her poems by. She figured out 20 ways to create a Haiku. 
"Japanese poetry does not tell you what to think or feel or be; it tells you what is. That is the beauty of it—written in the moment, and the moment is usually very good.”!
 Her sage advice:
“Read past winners; read haiku from translations from the Japanese masters; take a walk and open yourself to the world and people. Do it with the intention of letting everything in, open to what is there, because the world is so fantastic.
When it comes into you it comes in on images or sound or feelings or touch or taste… and there’s the haiku."
Her archived website https://www.ahapoetry.com/ has amazing poetry and links to her teachings. A rich resource for haiku writers that includes other suggested readings! Check it out and expand your haiku vision. 
Jane chose to depart this world and her life long study in 2016 and wrote her obituary two months before her death. Her legacy is profound contribution to the Haiku world.
Some of her poems can be found here:
https://livinghaikuanthology.com/index-of-poets/alphabetic-index/86-r-poets/jane...
Other sources:
https://breathhaiku.wordpress.com/about-the-author/
https://poetrysociety.org.nz/affiliates/haiku-nz/haiku-poems-articles/my-favouri...
https://www.ahapoetry.com/JRBIO.HTM
Thanks for reading! Haiku on. 
eyestar  |
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 Do you read or study haiku? Do you have any mentors or gems or links to share about this ancient short form? Please share!
Thank you so much for your kind responses to my last newsletter! "Poetry Newsletter (July 24, 2019)"
Xiea
"Such beautiful poems inspire all of us on here to write more thought provoking poems of this sort!
queenkissy
"Thank you for including my poem!
I hadn't heard of Alison Cockburn before this newsletter, but I love The Flowers of the Forest. It's a shame most of her works were lost. What jewels the world is missing!"
and in answer to my query: Do you have an inspirational mentor or influence as Alison may have been to Walter? or like Rilke was to A young poet? Who is in your corner?
Monty 
"I do. All of the old masters who wrote lines of rhyme."
Me too!!  |
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Poetry: November 13, 2019 Issue [#9863]
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