Carpe Diem's Kasen Renga Session #1

Credits: Kasen Renga Session

Good day dear Haijin, visitors and travelers,

I love to introduce a new feature here on Carpe Diem. With the Tan Renga episodes I already started a nice way to write haiku together. And today I will introduce our next step in our Renga playing. It's an experiment and I hope it will work out.

Today our first Kasen Renga Session starts. I love to try a Kasen renga with you all. A Kasen Renga is a Renga of 36 linked verses following the next path 5-7-5, 7-7, 5-7-5, 7-7 .... and so on. Just like the Tan Renga you have to write a stanza through associating on the verse before your turn.
Our beloved haiku originated from this Renga, a chain of verses following the above mentioned structure. The Renga started with the so called Hokku (openings verse) written by a haiku poet. The next poet wrote the next stanza and so on. The poet who writes the last stanza called Ageku has to associate on the hokku (and the verse before him/her) so the Kasen Renga is closed properly as a chain or circle.

The Kasen Renga follows a structure in which there are themes which you have to use in the stanzas. I will give you the structure later on in this post. First I like to tell you how this is going to work.

I start the Kasen Renga with a Hokku and the next poet writes the following stanza in the comments field. There will be no linking widget and you have to be alert on which stanza you have to write. So e.g. poet A writes the first verse 5-7-5, poet B writes the 7-7 stanza, then poet C writes the following stanza of 5-7-5 ... the importants thing in this is that you have to read the comment before you, so you know which stanza you have to write. (!!!! DON'T FORGET THE NUMBER OF THE STANZA IN YOUR COMMENT !!!!).

Let us try this .... we will see how it's gonna work out. I will give now the structure of our first Kasen Renga:

1. Hokku 5-7-5 (Summer)
2. 7-7 (Summer)
3. 5-7-5 (Love)
4. 7-7 (Freedom)
5. 5-7-5 (Moon/ Autumn)
6. 7-7 (Autumn)
7. 5-7-5 (Autumn)
8. 7-7 (Love)
9. 5-7-5 (Love/ Flowers)
10. 7-7 (Love/ Free verse, no theme)
11. 5-7-5 (Water)
12. 7-7 (Rocks/ Mountains)
13. 5-7-5 (Moon/ Winter)
14. 7-7 (Winter)
15. 5-7-5 (Love/ Flowers)
16. 7-7 (Bamboo)
17. 5-7-5 (Flower/ Spring)
18. 7-7 (Spring)
19. 5-7-5 (Spring)
20. 7-7 (Moon/ Autumn)
21. 5-7-5 (Pigeons)
22. 7-7 (Love)
23. 5-7-5 (Summer)
24. 7-7 (Summer)
25. 5-7-5 (Pebble)
26. 7-7 (Love)
27. 5-7-5 (Flower)
28. 7-7 (Water)
29. 5-7-5 (Moon/ Spring)
30. 7-7 (Summer)
31. 5-7-5 (Autumn)
32. 7-7 (Winter)
33. 5-7-5 (free verse, no theme)
34. 7-7 (Flower/ Spring)
35. 5-7-5 (Rocks/ Mountains)
36. Ageku 7-7 (Spring)

This structure, not exact the classic structure, is called a 'Summer Renga'. So the Hokku must be a Summer haiku. (Behind the syllables per stanza you can read the theme for that stanza). The title of this first Carpe Diem's Kasen Renga Session is taken form the Hokku, "no lonely night".

Credits: Firefly

Title:

"No Lonely Night", a Summer Renga

Startdate: June 21th
Closingdate: July 22th


Hokku (5-7-5) by Chèvrefeuille (your host):

firefly party
their fragile light caresses me -
no lonely night

(c) Chèvrefeuille (pseudonym of Kristjaan Panneman)


have fun, feel free to post your stanza to our first Kasen Renga Session. Good Luck!!!

Chèvrefeuille, your host