The Defiling of Haiku: Americanization be Damned

The three lined haiku: something every American teen embraces. It contains five syllables, seven syllables, five syllables in corresponding lines. You’ve already read why syllables are meaningless in haiku, but what else could possibly be wrong?

Haiku can be in any number of meters. Haiku is the abbreviation for the phrase “haikai no ku” meaning a verse of haikai. Traditionally, the haiku is printed in one vertical line, but written in any number. Although the written number is generally three, it can be as few as one or as many as infinity but very rare exceeds three.

The traditional Japanese haiku contains any number of meters consisting of seventeen “on”, a “kigo” (season word), and most likely a “kireji” (a punctuation word like “ya”). Since English does not contain an equivalent to “kireji” other punctuation is used; a semi-colon, comma or colon are the most common choices. Since English punctuation has no sound, the punctuation is not counted towards the number of morae (the English equivalent to “on”). This results in a longer poem than traditional Japanese haiku.

Using the English equivalent of punctuation isn’t nearly as bad as using syllables instead of morae. Using seventeen syllables can result in twice or even thrice the length of traditional Japanese haiku!

The Westernization has changed the definition of haiku for years to come. Americans and other English speaking countries are stuck in the abyss of poetry damnation. Instead of writing what has for centuries held unique and seasonable characteristics, many are writing what it has transformed into over only the past few decades due to English mutilation.

The results are horrific. The Westernization of haiku has taken a whole new meaning. What is often referred to as “haiku” is in reality nothing more than free-style. How many have you read don’t contain a season word? How many are stuck in the mindset of “three meters is best”? How many have you read contain seventeen syllables instead of morae?