Carpe Diem Weekend Meditation #96 Little Ones ... Sedoka

!! Open for your submissions next Sunday August 4th at 7:00 PM (CEST) !!

Dear Haijin, visitors and travelers,

Welcome at the first weekend meditation of August 2019. This month our theme is "Field Of Flowers", but that's not the theme for this weekend meditation. For this weekend meditation I have chosen to challenge you to create an other kind of Japanese poetry ... Sedoka. I will explain what Sedoka is.

For this "special feature "Little Ones" I have created a new logo and maybe I will use this special feature more often here at CDHK, not only in the weekends, but maybe also as an extra feature on weekdays.

For this logo I have used a renown Japanese woodblock by Katsushika Hokusai (1760–1849) and it's titled: Under the Wave off Kanagawa (Kanagawa oki nami ura), also known as The Great Wave.

Maybe you can remember that special feature "Little Ones" that I used often here at CDHK, maybe if you are a long time member you will surely know that special feature.

Sedoka:

A Sedoka is an unrhymed poem composed of two katauta. A katauta has three lines with the syllable pattern 5-7-7 and is complete in itself and able to stand alone. A Sedoka therefore has the syllable count: 5-7-7, 5-7-7.

In order to be correct, each katauta must be able to be read independently, but also create a cohesive singular work in the Sedoka. Often a Sedoka will address the same subject from different perspectives.

An example:

dark clouds cloak the night;
chilly winds creak gnarled branches,
grasping as bony fingers.

disturbed raven squawks
at frightened children - screaming,
then laughing - they throw him treats

© James Dean Chase

Face In The Mirror (image found on viewbug) (image © beamiyoung)

Here is a Sedoka I wrote several years ago:

behind a veil of clouds
she hides her bright face
she ... the queen of night's sky

in the mirror she looks
at her once beautiful face
mother of two boys and girls

© Chèvrefeuille

I think it's a nice Japanese poetry form and next to haiku and tanka, I think Sedoka fits us all. Try it yourself.

This weekend meditation is open for your submissions next Sunday August 4th at 7:00 PM (CEST) and will remain open until August 11th at noon (CEST). Have a great weekend!

Carpe Diem #1564 Las Vegas ... come on gamble (out of the box)

Dear Haijin, visitors and travelers,

We are haiku-ing along the Pan American Highway, a 30.000 km long highway straight through the Americas from north to south. Yesterday we stopped at the City of Angels and today ... we will stop in ... say the opposite of Los Angeles, Las Vegas ... in the mddle of the desert were you can have a wonderful vacation and ... gambling.

Maybe you can remember our special feature "Out Of The Box" in which I challenged you all to create another kind of Japanese poetry or a different Far Eastern country like Korea for example.

Today I love to give you a "new" task. Think Out Of The Box with the themes of haiku. For example create a senryu, Cherita, Kyoka, or Sedoka. You also may "gamble" with the form by going free style. In other words ... "today it's your choice and not mine".

Las Vegas

The above image is a "still" of a time-lapse of the Las Vegas Strip. It's a nice image and I hope it will inspire you to think "Out Of The Box" ... well go for it!

This episode is NOW OPEN for your submissions and will remain open until Dacember 18th at noon (CET). I will try to publish our new episode later on. For now ... have fun!

Carpe Diem Extra September 28th 2018, pre-announcement October 2018

credits

Dear Haijin, visitors and travelers,

It's almost October and that means ... time to celebate as we do every year in October, the month in which I started CDHK back in 2012. This year we will celebrate our 6th anniversary and I hope it will be a wonderful month full of celbrations. However this year I hadn't enough time to invite celebs from the poetry and musical world to join in our celebrations. So our upcoming anniversary I will try to create all episodes to celebrate our 6th anniversary.

So I cannot tell you what we are going to do, but of course I have already created a new logo for our celebration month. That logo I have published already at the right side of our Kai, but I will give it here again.

As you can see this logo shows you Mount Fuji, the Holy Mountain of Japan, surrounded by the beautiful colored leaves of the Japanese Maple. Of course no need to tell you why I have chosen this logo for our 6th anniversary, but I will tell you why this choice ...

Mount Fuji is the Holy Mountain of Japan and it's celebrated in many haiku and tanka for example this one by Basho:

Mount Fuji
like the tea-grinding mill
carried by the lice . . .

© Basho (age 33)

Mount Fuji in autumn

Or this one written by Yozakura, the Unknown haiku poet and apprentice of Basho:

through cherry blossoms
at the end of the day -
snow on Mount Fuji

© Yozakura

And that's not all what I can tell about my choice. The Japanese Maple is one of the most beautiful trees and if its leaves are coloring than the Japanese know that it's really autumn. Maybe you are familiair with the thought that autumn is the most beautiful season to write haiku (and tanka) about, not only for its colors, or feeling of departing, but also because the moon is on her brightest in autumn according to the Japanese.

So this logo points in many facets towards haiku, the first idea fromwhich CDHK evolved to what it has become now ... a warmhearted family of poets that love the beauty of Japanese poetry.

Next month we will celebrate our sixth anniversary and I hope you all will be part of it.

Hope to see you all next month as we will celebrate our 6th anniversary. Come on ... be part of it. Invite your friends to participate in this celebration.

Namasté,

Chèvrefeuille, your host.

Carpe Diem Weekend-Meditation #21 Out Of The Box #3 Chōka and Sedōka (Winter / Summer)

!!! Open for your submissions next Sunday February 25th at 7:00 PM (CET) !!!

Dear Haijin, visitors and travelers,

Welcome at a new Weekend-Meditation. This weekend I have chosen for another nice "Out Of The Box" episode. In this "Out Of The Box" feature I share other poetry forms, mostly Japanese forms, but also other modern forms.

This weekend I love to challenge you to create a Chōka or a Sedōka. I will tell you a little bit more about it hereafter. This "Out Of The Box" episode I have also chosen a task for you. That task is to create a Winter poem and a Summer poem, but you have to use the Chōka or the Sedōka form.

The chōka, “long poem,” is of indefinite length, formed of alternating lines of five and seven syllables, ending with an extra seven-syllable line. Many chōka have been lost; the shortest of those extant are 7 lines long, the longest have 150 lines. They may be followed by one or more envoys (hanka). The amplitude of the chōka permitted the poets to treat themes impossible within the compass of the tanka.

The sedōka, or “head-repeated poem,” consists of two tercets of five, seven, and seven syllables each. An uncommon form, it was sometimes used for dialogues. Kakinomoto Hitomaro’s sedōka are noteworthy. Chōka and sedōka were seldom written after the 8th century.

An example of a Sedoka:

in the backyard -
a rainbow of chrysanthemums
finally autumn has arrived

monks chanting mantras
while sweeping the garden
being one with the universe

© Chèvrefeuille

This weekend meditation is open for your submissions and next Sunday February 25th at 7:00 PM (CET) and will remain open until Sunday March 4th at noon (CET). Have a wonderful weekend.

Carpe Diem Winter Retreat 2017 "Life is Beautiful"

Dear Haijin, visitors and travelers,

It's time again for our Carpe Diem Retreat, 30 days of writing haiku and tanka, one a day on a theme. Winter is closing in, so here is the Carpe Diem Winter Retreat 2017. For this CDHK Retreat I have chosen the theme "Life is Beautiful". I think it's a wonderful theme and I am looking forward to all of your responses.

CDHK's Winter Retreat 2017 starts tonight at 10:00 PM (CET) and will run to November 15th 10:00 PM (CET).

Snow Covered Tulips (image found on Pinterest)

tulips
snow covered
fragile beauty

© Chèvrefeuille

Have fun!

PS. You can submit all kinds of Japanese Poetry

Carpe Diem's Road to Yesterday Celebrating Five Years of Japanese Poetry #1 Introduction "right from the heart"

Dear Haijin, visitors and travelers,

Let us take a trip back in time, back to September 2012, especially September 17th 2012. On that day I put Carpe Diem online with a kind of introductory, welcoming episode, for a new daily haiku meme inspired on a few other daily haiku memes in which I participated.

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September 17, 2012:

our first logo

This is my new weblog. I am Chèvrefeuille a Dutch haiku poet. I love to start a new daily meme for haiku poets. This weblog is the base for that haiku meme.
I hope to see a lot of visitors to enjoy the fun of writing haiku, a classical Japanese poem, on a theme given every day.

be inspired
write your little verses
right from the heart

I hope to see you all soon.

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As I look back to that time of preparations for the first ever prompt at Carpe Diem I smile. What nervous I was if it would work, if I could make it happen ... a daily haiku meme ... I was excited as I started, but also anxious ... because it had took me a lot of time and I just hoped it would work, it would become a success ... At that time I thought: "I just will give it a try, maybe it will last only for a few months, but than I have tried it". At that time I really hadn't thought that Carpe Diem would still exist several years later, yes of course I hoped it would be a success ... but there was at first the language. I had chosen to use English, but that's not my maiden language and at that time I didn't wrote a lot in English, but ... during the years I think my English has become better, at least good enough to write the blogs / episodes.

When the preparations were ready I finally could publish the first episode, Waterfall, that was on September 21st 2012, but the submissions started on October 1st 2012.

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September 21st, 2012:

For starters ... I will give the first prompt for this new daily haiku meme today. So you can think about it and be inspired.
Carpe Diem is a new daily haiku meme in which you can share your haiku. The haiku (or senryu) can be a classical or a non-classical one. It's all up to you. The first prompt for CARPE DIEM is waterfall. I think this is a great prompt to start with. Let flow your inspiration like a waterfall and share your haiku with us.

waterfall of colors
leaves whirl through the street -
departing summer

© Chèvrefeuille

Source: whirling leaves

Please be so kind to share a thought in the comment form. Do you have an idea for a new prompt? Well ... share it with us. I look forward to your contributions for this new haiku meme. And I hope it will be a success. I will try this to the end of the year ... so I hope that I can continue this haiku meme in January 2013.

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And so it started ... Carpe Diem, a daily haiku-meme. Back than the most episodes were short, mostly because of the fact that my English wasn't good enough, but also because of me being nervous if this project would succeed.
Well ... next month we will celebrating our fifth anniversary ... and I really hadn't thought that Carpe Diem, nowadays called Carpe Diem Haiku Kai, would be still alive and kicking. CDHK has grown, we are a real family of haiku loving poets, and there are more parts of CDHK and of course there was the wonderful cooperation with Jane Reichhold. She inspired me to go on and was also the one who gave me the inspiration, the idea, to create exclusive CDHK e-books.

Five years after the start of Carpe Diem ... a good reason to celebrate and I have to thank you all, my dear Haijin, visitors and travelers ... you all are my inspiration, my source, my engine to go on with Carpe Diem Haiku Kai.

like a family
you my dear friends I embrace -
unconditional love
shared by a bunch of haiku poets
from all over the world

© Chèvrefeuille

I am looking forward to our fifth anniversary next month and I hope you all do too, because we make Carpe Diem Haiku Kai together.

Have a great weekend.

Namasté,

Chèvrefeuille, your host

Chèvrefeuille, your host

Carpe Diem #440, Ghost-Writer Jules

 

Dear Haijin, visitors and travelers,

Here it is ... finally ... our first Ghost-Writer week. I hope this week will inspire you all to write wonderful haiku and maybe this week will make you enthousiastic to be a Ghost-Writer yourself for Carpe Diem ... if you would like to be Ghost-Writer for May 2014 than let me know and I will see what I can do for you. As all is going well than I hope to do a new Ghost-Writer week in week 19 (May 5th - 11th) ... Oke ... here it is our first Ghost Writer, Jules of Jules Gems and Stuff. Enjoy the read and share your haiku, senryu, tanka, kyoka or haibun with our haiku-family here at Carpe Diem Haiku Kai. 

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Ghost Writer for Haiku Kai: Jules (JulesPaige because words are like Jewels on a Page)

While I only have informal training in the art of haiku I enjoy the challenge of short forms to speak volumes. The haibun, while a good bit of prose can have haiku throughout or just as an ending summation. Though I have only been blogging for about two or three years, I have been experimenting with words for four decades (plus). And one of the things I enjoy doing is mixing short forms, I am a rebel that way. Some of my favorite short forms I have shared on my daily WordPress site on the following pages which explains these forms:

You can find more about these poetry-forms at:

jules gemstone pages and on jules gemstone pages more about haiku, pi-ku and tauku and on jules gemstone pages, more about the Lune

While I know there are many more short forms I encourage you too, to mix haiku with other short forms and share the 'how to’s' and your verse with us. I offer these examples:

Mirror Elfje Sandwiches  a haiku

Water
even lakes
constantly moves, flowing
tugged by the moon
change

returning to start -
looking to go home again
and yet we cannot…

change
tugged by the moon
moments ever changing
forward motion
tears

©JP/davh

Mixed short forms: Elfje Trio, haiku (three lines) and a three words

A Month of Goodbyes #6

I
Am the
Pink rubber ball
Smacked on the curb
Childhood

Childhood
Those days
Youthful carefree summers
Spent playing without fear
Melted

Melted
Memories flutter
Responsibilities grew – rose
To meet the sky
Good-bye

bounce, resiliency
adapt, mature, run the race
until breath ceases

…auf wiedersehen, adieu…

©JP/davh

haiku series with an Elfje closure:

Elegant Equations

careful devotion
dedication to our truths
the ones we were taught

they mattered then, when
in our younger days, counting
was part of the rule

then considered pure
though a borrowed form, haiku
brought us calming peace

and still now to us
in our counted days, matter;
ink in our souls runs

staccato and smooth
as our pastoral thoughts flow -
counting moons and stars…

practitioners preach
reaching new audiences
with calm devotion

counting our blessings
narrowing distances
with our own haiku

~~~

Counting
ever so
gently with ease
every syllable that matters -
seventeen

(c) JP/davh

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This episode is open for your submissions tonight at 7.00 PM (CET) and will remain open until April 9th 11.59 AM (CET). I will post our new Ghost-Writer episode written by Managua, later on today. For now ... have fun and be inspired.

Carpe Diem's "Little Ones" #5, Sedoka

Dear Haijin, visitors and travelers,

Another episode of our "Little Ones" feature in which I will look at other short poetry forms. I had promised you a "Little Ones" about Choka, a Japanese Long Poem, but I have decided to tell you more about Choka in another episode, maybe in aall new feature on Carpe Diem.
This episode of "Little Ones" is about Sedoka, no not Sudoku (smiles), it's a six line poem which has two stanzas, called katauta, the lines follow a syllable-structure 5-7-7  5-7-7. I am not familiar with this form, but I think it can be fun.

An example:

dark clouds cloak the night;
chilly winds creak gnarled branches,
grasping as bony fingers.

disturbed raven squawks
at frightened children - screaming,
then laughing - they throw him treats

(c) James Dean Chase

My attempt to write a Sedoka:

behind a veil of clouds
she hides her bright face
she ... the queen of night's sky

in the mirror she looks
at her once beautiful face
mother of two boys and girls

Another Sedoka attempt ... I like this form:

in the backyard -
a rainbow of chrysanthemums
finally autumn has arrived

monks chanting mantras
while sweeping the garden
being one with the universe

I don't really know if these are Sedoka, but at least they are wonderful poems in which I have laid my heart and soul.
Be welcome to share your Sedoka, or another short poem (excluding haiku), with us all at our Haiku Kai. It's fun to look beyond haiku ...

This episode of "Little Ones" will be open for your submissions 'til October 18th 11.59 AM (CET) and I will try to post a new "Little Ones" episode on that same day.