Sonia Sanchez is a prolific and award-winning poet, distinguished by the originality and range of her voice. But she is not a poet who comes to mind when I think of haiku.
And were they my own, I probably would not call the sequences in her recent collection haiku. These are human-centered fragments, in which kigo rarely appear. Few can stand outside the context of their sequences. Their power is in their layering.
They reminded me of a conversation I have had many times with my husband. Frustrated in my efforts to acquire rudimentary Japanese, I keep searching for the secret to fluency. His response, as a linguist and as someone who moves easily between languages: "At some point, you have to claim it and make it your own."
In her brief introduction, Sanchez writes of discovering haiku as a young woman and knowing immediately it offered something both ordinary and extraordinary, a connection to her true nature and to that which is greater than self, and she cites Patricia Donegan's Haiku Mind to elucidate. So, this is not a casual grabbing of a label. She has claimed this form and makes it her own. A few excerpts:
11.
to be born
to be raped
each journey a sudden wave
--from "sister haiku (for Pat)"
5.
("Portrait of Ella Fitzgerald")
Nose. mouth. eyes.
green. orange.
yellow voice spinning....
--from "6 haiku (for Beauford Delaney)"
10.
your hands
shimmering on the
legs of rain
--from "10 haiku (for Max Roach)"
This last sequence in honor of American jazz drummer Max Roach is stunning, especially in performance. You can hear Sanchez reading it at NPR in an April 2009 recording.
Morning Haiku is a praise song of a different sort. These are activist haiku, embracing humanity and celebrating connection to family, friends and those who came before us.
