Monday Haiku

I’ve decided that for one week, starting today, I’m going to flex my creative muscle and post one haiku a day–if you’re lucky, maybe some more!

For those of you who skipped haiku day in English class or have just forgotten, a haiku is a Japanese poem written in three lines.  The first line is five syllables, second line is seven, and the third is another five.  I actually learned this morning that real haikus are not measured by syllables but by “on”, which are like syllables but don’t work the same way.  From Wikipedia:

Although the word “on” is often translated as “syllable”, in fact one on is counted for a short syllable, an additional one for an elongated vowel, diphthong, or doubled consonant, and one more for an “n” at the end of a syllable. Thus, the word “haibun”, though counted as two syllables in English, is counted as four on in Japanese (ha-i-bu-n). This is illustrated by the Issa haiku below, which contains 17 on but only 15 syllables. In addition, some sounds, such as “kyo” (きょ) can be perceived as two syllables in English but as a single on in Japanese. A word that illustrates both these issues is “Tokyo”, which is perceived as having three syllables in English (To-ky-o) but four moras in Japanese (To-o-kyo-o).

Very interesting!  I will be writing mine in the grade school fashion of 5-7-5… I don’t think I could count “on” correctly!

It sounds easy, but they really do take a lot of concentration to do.  Today’s haiku:

Drills, cars, hammers so

early, wake me from my dreams.

Begin the day here.

Give it your best shot!  Post your haikus!!