Haiku Society of America Renku Awards
in Memorial of Bernard Lionel Einbond
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HSA Renku Awards for 2003
Alice Benedict and Patricia
Machmiller
judges
Grand Prize
New Coolness
Yu
Chang
Paul MacNeil
John Stevenson
Hilary Tann
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New Coolness
new coolness
a perfect day
for climbing
js
red maple leaves
line most of the bootprints
pwm
she reads
mother's pancake recipe
by moonlight
ht
the usual suspects
of a murder mystery
yc
accountants
in three-piece suits
and handcuffs
pwm
I offer you my
name
with a hyphen
js
at Las Vegas
our best man
hits the jackpot
yc
bright nasturtiums
frame the herb garden
ht
all five
car doors
frozen shut
js
cardboard boxes
on a subway vent
yc
tattoos tensed
the harpooner
listens
pwm
eye to eye
with an eagle
js
it rained
on their golf course
rendezvous
ht
whispering...
under a pool umbrella
pwm
sangria
on the rocks
and slivers of moon
yc
the photojournalist
adjusts his lens
ht
we sense
the silent prayer
is about to end
js
rich soil
yields to the harrow
pwm
on the classroom wall
shadows
of magnolia blossoms
ht
homemade nets
for the smelt run
yc
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Honorable Mention
Open Convertible
Roger Abe
Ann Bendixen
donnalynn chase
Anne Homan
June Hopper Hymas
Carol Steele
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Open Convertible
the climb up green hills
too narrow for cars to pass
open convertible
cs
warmed by spring sunshine
well-planned bricks, wood & glass
dc
a measuring worm
inches across my ankle
it tickles
ah
wasabi peas
in a porcelain bowl
ab
between the clouds
every now and then—
fingernail moon
ah
as a thank you gift
he paints her an autumn landscape
jhh
the quail struts and sings
along the deck railing—
"Chi-ca-go"
ah
can they see Godzilla
through a steamed-up windshield?
ra
talk over breakfast
of renewing our vows—
our coffee grows cold
dc
angry gods
clash over the desert
ab
a new talk show
with Monica Lewinsky
minus her beret
jhh
back from China - my workmates
greet me with facemasks
dc
spotlight burned out
but tonight it doesn't matter—
summer moon
jhh
lizards skitter any old way
across the railroad ties
ah
above the floodwaters
Coyote lives on Mt. Diablo—
Miwok folk tale
ah
recommended restaurant—
sullen waiters but good food
cs
Kiyoko - tell me
how would you tread on these
cherry petals?
dc
long
lazy ripples where
willow tips touch the stream
jhh
silver windmills
line the ridges—
only a few spinning
ah
hard-boiled eggs
yucky without salt
ab
ranch hands discuss
the merits of yodeling—
the hogs just snort
ra
verse writing as a game—
we argue with laughter
dc
I make new clothes
for my granddaughter's doll—
Christmas Eve
cs
winter mist - her neighbor
must enter a nursing home
ah
Marines play ping-pong—
an occasional distant
burst of gunfire
ah
"that OLD BLACK MAGIC"
with Louis and Keely
ra
ninety thousand hits
she punches in another
sperm dot com
ab
feng shui at work
in our master bedroom
dc
moon of falling leaves
above the flicker's grave
we set a stone
jhh
November dusk
winds scour the cliff
ah
the salmon leaps
over obstacles, toward
that familiar scent
ra
a shaft of sun
on the bicycle's yellow basket
jhh
Michelangelo's
Madonna, can marble know
grief and joy?
ra
hand-in-hand the toddlers
lead the family hike
ah
Ikebana class—
the teacher arranges
first cherry blossoms
cs
Mother's day surprise
it must be good - she smiles
ra
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The Haiku Society of America sposors this annual award for renku of 36, 20, or 12 stanzas.
See the contest guidelines for the HSA Renku Awards.
For more information about the goals of this contest, download a copy of the HSA Renku Contest Committee Report (pdf) published in Frogpod XIII:2 (May 1990).
Awards by year:
| 2018 | 2017 | 2016 | 2014 | 2013 | 2012 | 2011 | 2010 | 2009 | 2008 | 2007 | 2006 | 2005 | 2004 | 2003 | 2002 | 2001 |
2003 judges commentary:
We chose two winning poems that generally hold to the formal structure of renku and also capture its playful collaborative spirit. Both poems, in their own distinctive ways, skillfully touch on a panorama of human experience with tenderness and humor.
Grand Prize - New Coolness
The Grand Prize winner is New Coolness, a nijuin (20-link) renku with four authors. The poem as a whole has a stately tone, set at the beginning with the expansive sense of the outdoors on a fine early autumn day. As expected, the first two verses are tightly linked, followed by a shift in location, topic, and point of view in the third verse. After this calm start, shifts become more lively. A freer range of topics, as well as interesting shifts in scale and focus of each verse quickens the pace. Yet because verses all have a kind of contained intensity, reinforced by similarity in rhetoric and syntax, the poem remains contemplative throughout. The treatment of the flower verses is unorthodox. Normally, these verses must refer to cherry blossoms, but the authors chose to use "bright nasturtiums" and "shadows of magnolia blossoms" instead. The effect is interesting, especially in a 20-link poem in English. However, if you were expecting cherry blossom verses with their complex allusive resonance, these verses, though well-integrated in the poem, might be less captivating.
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2003 judges commentary:
Honorable Mention - Open Convertible
An Honorable Mention is awarded to Open Convertible, a kasen renku with five authors. This poem has a much wider emotional and rhetorical range than the grand prize winner. In addition to the variety of topics, the authors use quotations, questions, and varied syntax (not just statements). This adds liveliness to fast sections and heightened emotional impact to verses that are already in high relief (such as the first flower verse). More than one set of verses are beautifully composed and linked. For example the sequence from verse 23 to 26 is an elegant excursion from winter verses to the beginning of the series of love verses:
23) I make new clothes/for my granddaughter's doll/ Christmas Eve
24) winter mist—her neighbor/must enter a nursing home
25) Marines play ping-pong/an occasional distant/burst of gunfire
26) "that OLD BLACK MAGIC"/with Louis and Keely
However the poem's opening is not handled as skillfully. Topics are repeated ("sunshine" and "clouds"), and the wakiku (2nd verse) is a bit unfocused. Because the opening verses set the tone for the whole renku, these are serious shortcomings. In other sections as well, repeated topics create parallel links that tend to deflate the energy of the poem. We mention this because in our experience, renku benefits from careful editing, both during and after composition, with a view to formal renku rules.
What might at first seem like prescriptions and prohibitions, are more like efficient reminders to record a playful poetic conversation connected not by subject matter, rhetoric, or point of view, but by sensitivity to the feeling and experience that breathes in each verse. The winning poems do approach this ideal, and we congratulate the authors for their success!
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