!! I hope to post our regular episode later on today. I hope to have it created and online on time !!
Dear Haijin, visitors and travelers,
Another week has gone by and it's time for a new (bi-weekly) episode of Carpe Diem "Sparkling Stars" in which I share haiku ("sparkling stars") of classical and non-classical haiku poets. This week I have a surprise for you all I think.
For this "Sparkling Stars" I have a wonderful haiku to share with you. This haiku is the winner of our first Sea Shell Game 2014.
It wasn't easy to find the winner of our Sea Shell Game and I love to tell you first how I have done this.
First I wrote all the entries (12 haiku) on pieces of paper, which I put into a little box. I shook the pieces for a while and took one after another from the box. The first haiku I placed against the second haiku pulled out of the box and so on. In that way I had six pairs of haiku.
I studied all pairs for a while and used the following points to make my choice:
1. Is there a kigo in the haiku?
2. Did the writer use a kireiji (cuttingword, mostly interpunction or a natural stop)?
3. Is there a deeper layer hidden in it?
4. The overall image.
I did the same after the first shift, which brought me six haiku in three pairs. In that second shift I again looked at the above mentioned points to make these six haiku back to three haiku.
The third shift was the most difficult, because I had to choose from three haiku.
In the last shift there were two haiku to choose from ... in this shift I looked again and again to the both haiku with the above points and finally I decided to make my choice ... which I talked about with a good friend of mine. A friend with no haiku experience, he had just to look at the both haiku and tell me which he liked the most. He chose the following haiku and I must say ... he had a very good taste ...
The winner of our first Sea Shell Game is ... drum roll ... Sara McNulty of Purple Pen In Portland and here is her winning haiku:
Ocean tide ebbs
Sand glistens with sea treasures
Lucent blue beach glass
© Sara McNulty
I think this haiku is a beauty and I think this haiku is a great winner of our first Sea Shell Game. I will thank you all for being part of this Sea Shell Game and maybe ... maybe ... next year we will have another Sea Shell Game ... you never know.
Congratulations Sara ... I will create a haiga from your haiku and will send it to you by e-mail.
Now ... back to this episode of "Sparkling Stars" ... you have to write an all new haiku (or tanka) inspired on the haiku by Sara McNulty, our Sea Shell Game winner. So be inspired and share your haiku (or tanka) with us all.
Here is my attempt to write an all new haiku inspired on the haiku by Sara.
walking along the beach
following the tracks of a hermit crab -
Ah! That salty air
© Chèvrefeuille
This episode of Carpe Diem "Sparkling Stars" is NOW OPEN for your submissions and will remain open until next Thursday December 11th at noon (CET). Have fun!
All the best Sara!
ReplyDeleteI am indeed looking for a vacation soon... to walk in the footsteps of hermit crabs...*sigh*
Thanks, Jules! Have a wonderful vacation.
DeleteOcean tide ebbs
ReplyDeleteSand glistens with sea treasures
Lucent blue beach glass
You have chosen well, KP.
This gem has so much poetic diction stored inside its 61 letters.
The choice of 'glisten' over similar words like 'sparkle', 'shine', 'glimmer', 'gleam' , is brilliant. Pardon the pun.:-)
'glisten' is what sweat does on the skin, and that is just exactly what is needed here. You can see the little wavy lines of dried up salt, with that bit of dampnes on the hard-trodden sand left by the retreating water.
Then come the good things: the treasures that are left behind. I want to pick them up, inspect them, and maybe take some home for my collections.
'ebb and flood'. We all know the sea does ebb and flood, but Sara has put us in the picture in the fewest letters, the simplest words. I can think of clumsy ways I might have opened the concept of this haiku. But none would have been so concise and sparing as her line. We are there, with her on the walk. I presume one has to actually see this with real eyes, rather than Wordsworth's 'inward eye'.
Then there is the delicious series of the letter -s- in line 2, giving us a background of sound.And to conclude, the colour and transparency of glass. Not simply translucent but lucent, 'giving off light'. We don't know if it is the silicon of the sand itself, or washed up shards of bottles, leading us to the ocean going vessels that careless threw their unwanted items overboard, or possibly the 'yo ho ho and a bottle of rum' from ancient travellers.
'lucent blue', with their letter -l- and their assonance [=the repetition of vowel sounds in nearby words] provide another little nugget of pleasure.
And those are onlythe aspects that I managed to put into words.
Thank you so much, Girl Friday! I appreciate your taking the time to write your thoughts on this.
DeleteFun. Congrats to Sara :)
ReplyDeleteThanks, Lolly!
DeleteLovely haiku -- congrats Sara
ReplyDeleteThanks, Brud.
DeleteCongratulations Sara :)
ReplyDeleteThanks so much, Jen!
DeleteKristjaan, I am honored that you picked my haiku for this challenge. Thanks so much, and thank you for all the knowledge you impart, and your wonderful prompts.
ReplyDeleteit was really a great haiku ... so ... congrats and i am glad that you're happy with winning this first edition of our Sea Shell Game.
DeleteThank you for your kind words.