I ... entered the poem of life, whose purpose is ... simply to witness the beauties of the world, to discover the many forms that love can take. (Barabara Blackman in 'Glass After Glass')

These poems are works in progress and may be updated without notice. Nevertheless copyright applies to all writings here and all photos (which are either my own or used with permission). Thank you for your comments. I read and appreciate them all, and reply here to specific points that seem to need it — or as I have the leisure. Otherwise I reciprocate by reading and commenting on your blog posts as much as possible.

13 May 2017

Attempting a Haiku Puzzler


Rules of the game:

The goal is to re-create the scrambled haiku of three haiku poets, but to make it somewhat more difficult, I have used four scrambled haiku.

Below you find an image in which you can find all the lines of these three haiku. To find the three haiku you get three hints:

1. This haiku poet brought haiku into the 20th century by mentioning a modern invention.

2. This haiku is renown all over the globe.


3. At the end of the life of a haiku poet the custom was to write a Jisei (death-poem). This is the jisei of a famous female poet.


To make the "haiku puzzler" complete you have to submit the three found haiku including the name of the haiku poet.

Scrambled lines:











I can get 2 and 3

2.
old pond
frogs jump into
water sound
by Basho

This is indeed world-renowned.

3. I am guessing that this is the jisei, though only the middle line is certain (and I don't know who wrote it):

having gazed at the moon
I depart from this life
with a blessing

Google tells me I got this right and that the author is Chiyo-ni

Which leaves my guesses at the other two as:

young foliage
after the passage of a train
smoke whirls

morning dew
evaporates in the early sunlight
spirit climbs to the sky

I am further guessing that the first of them is number 1 in the puzzle, because of the mention of a train – but again I don't know the author.

Google  tells me I got that right too, and that the author is Shiki – which I half-guessed because I knew he lived into the twentieth century. (Only, his version had my first and third lines reversed!)

I did rather guess that the fourth haiku might be by Chevrefeuille himself, and Google tells me that is so. But as he wrote it, in the version I found, it reads: 

in the early sunlight
morning dew evaporates
spirits climb to the sky

It was great fun playing this game, and I think I did quite well despite my ignorance. (Smile.)

11 comments:

  1. I thought of Chiyo-ni also, but that's neither here nor there since she is the only female haiku poet I know:) I like the way yours turned out:)

    Pat

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    1. With a little help from my friend Mr Google, lol.

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  2. You did great. That 4th haiku is indeed one of my own, but reworked.

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    1. Thank you! (I think your reworked version is even better.)

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  3. Wow. My brain admires the verses, all of them. But could never have leaped so nimbly through this complicated exercise. Bravo!

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    1. Years of playing with haiku (smile) ... and yet I am learning so much from the Carpe Diem site.

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  4. Ya done good! I guessed chiyo ni somewhere in there and the Basho one was easy. After that, my brain just started making up my own mashup haiku with the phrases.

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    Replies
    1. Yes ... it took me a little while to realise that the spirit climbing to the sky was NOT part of the jisei.

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  5. Thoroughly enjoyed this adventure with you.

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  6. A fantastic success Rosemary! Riddles and games are exhaustive efforts!

    Hank

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  7. I didnt post but i guessed Basho, chi yoni, and Shiki.

    Didn't guess Chevrefeuille (✿◠‿◠) that one was just for me confusing

    much love...

    ReplyDelete

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