2023 CONTEST RESULTS

Preselector – Seren Fargo, USA

Final judge and comments – Kit Nagamura, Japan

 

 

 

Kit Nagamura / Picks for SGP

 

The better the collection of entries, the harder it is to judge a haiku contest. Some of the outstanding poets who have participated in this year’s Sharpening the Green Pencil event write in the classic format, and some prefer a more modern vein, minus the kigo.

Some address heavy, somber subjects, and others preserve the karumi, or lightness, that Matsuo Basho so prized in his later years. It is my belief that great haiku come in a variety of forms, and we know them immediately, because they resonate with concrete sensation and truth, but also leave space for interpretation. I have deep appreciation for the works I’ve had the honor to read, and I thank the winners for sharing their visions of the world.

 

First Place

 

half time 

my son and I exchange 

our goal posts

 

Srinivasa Rao Sambangi, India, Hyderabad

 

 

At first glance, this haiku seems to suggest a father and son simply changing sides at the halftime of a game of soccer, football, rugby, or hockey. We don’t know if it’s a game in which they are both playing, or simply watching together and rooting for separate teams, but we do know halftimes usually come at the 45-minute point, and last 13-15 minutes. Instead of employing a seasonal kigo, the author here subtly addresses a time of life when the relationship between a father and son shifts, and when their goals can be reversed. Perhaps the urge to make money and be successful fades into a desire for quality family time as a father ages or approaches the halftime of his life, at 45. Sons, often by age 15, are ready to try on independence from their parents, and their goals change, too, focusing outwardly toward their own futures. By leaving in the word “posts” at the end of the haiku, the author saves the poem from didacticism, and creates a thoughtful work on the dynamics of family life.

 

 

 

 

Second Place

 

yesterday’s news 

in a wire basket 

another war

 

Addison Redley, UK, London

 

 

Skillful alliteration, with the repetition of w’s, makes the reading of this haiku easy, but the subject matter—the short news cycles covering something as momentous as war—condemns our inability to learn from yesterday’s mistakes. The wire basket, presumably the kind that sits on a news desk, takes on an ominous chill with the final line, turning into a metal cage that holds a record of horrors, read and soon forgotten repeatedly. This dark haiku is a good example of where modern haiku shines, and when a seasonal reference might be beside the point.

 

 

 

Third Place

 

first light 

the trail to his burial place 

speckled with petals

 

Cristina-Valeria Apetrei, , Romania, Saveni

 

 

 

At dawn, a spring path to the “burial place” of someone or something, is scattered with fallen blossoms. The scene is pretty, as if nature has festooned the trail with an offering to the dead, and yet of course the fallen petals themselves are expiring. A “trail” and a “burial place” both suggest great intimacy—this is not, it would seem, a formal cemetery, but a place selected specially, a secret interment location. This led me to suspect the haiku is about a deceased beloved pet. The fact that there is a trail suggests that the burial place is visited often enough to maintain a clear path, and that someone (the poet perhaps) prefers the earliest light of day to visit and remember the lost one. The poem brings a lightness to the grieving process and to mono-no-aware, or awareness of the ephemeral nature of life.

 

 

Honorable Mentions (3, in no specific order)

 

winter deepens ... 

in an old coat pocket  

blue glass beads

 

Daniela Misso, Italy, San Gemini (TR)

 

 

Winter arrives, and an old coat is taken from the closet. From inside its deep pocket, conjuring the darkness of profound winter, emerge blue glass beads, the color and temperature of ice. There is pleasing mystery here: whose beads, and why were they forgotten?

 

***

 

fall’s carpet 

the crisp sound  

of crème brûlée

 

Sandra St-Laurent, Canada, Whitehorse

 

 

How skillfully this helps us hear the thin sugar-brittle leaves of fall, and the way they crack under the lightest pressure. Alliteration of repeating hard “c” sounds adds to the crunching tableau. Finally, the poet points out the sweetness of fall, when the scent of leaves and leaf smoke fill the air, and the earth is still soft below.

 

***

 

star by star 

the lane lights up . . . 

snowdrops

 

Marion Clarke, Northern Ireland, Warrenpoint

 

 

 

We at first imagine a lane at night to be lit up, somewhat implausibly, by celestial stars; only the last line reveals the surprise of snowdrops. The observation that snowdrops are indeed visible at night, and might light up the runway of a lane, is wonderful.

 

 

Commended (3, in no particular order)

 

unsold roses 

in the dumpster  

valentine’s day

 

Ruwanka Jayatillake, Canada, Calgary

 

  ***

 

my last-ditch effort 

to keep you with me . . . 

dandelion fluffs

 

Ivan Gaćina, Croatia, Zadar

 

 ***

 

foggy morning 

the unpicked rose hips 

in signal red

 

Viktoriya Marinova, Bulgaria, Sofia