What is so special about these small poems that so many people want to read or write them? Haiku is basically related to an Eastern world vision, it is meditative and is often linked with Zen. Haiku helps to experience our daily world more vividly and directly; it helps us to live with intense awareness and openness. It has been described as a recording of the essence of a moment, the ‘haiku moment’. Many feel that a haiku should link up with nature, or Nature, as an essential condition, but I am not that strict. Haiku is about expressing a sensation, using a very limited set of words. An example, on the theme ‘hope’ I wrote:
Over dark fields
dawn is breaking over the distant horizon,
with coloring soft light.
A challenge is the language, as translation is impossible: a haiku in English will be completely different from a one in Dutch. Another challenge is to find out how haiku and visual/plastic arts can meet, can reinforce each other…...
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