Poetry Friday: The Haibun Form and Inspiration

I’ve never written a haibun and could not remember what the context was of
writing one, although I know I’ve read several from my poetry peers. As I was
looking for some poetry form to try to encapsulate our recent trip to Maine,
the word haibun popped into my mind. (I must have remembered something about
this form, as it seemed a perfect fit for some of the observations, I made
about the natural settings in Maine’s Acadia National Park and the state’s
rocky coast.)

Poets.org
offers a nice synopsis of the form but not enough examples of how the prose and
haiku work together. They espoused how the two writing forms work together to
form a haibun but not enough examples of actual writings. This is just my opinion
of course, but it sent me looking elsewhere.

Now that I have an idea of form and an idea from which part of my trip, I’ll
focus on the haibun, I need to read some more specific examples other than
the famous ancient poet Basho.

Here are some sources I checked:

Writer’s Digest Poetic Forms: Haibun Poems

Poetry Soup: Haibun Poems/Haibun Examples

Haibun by Contemporary Writer’s a compilation by Ray Rasmussen

While I am very sure my haibun will not turn out as I wish or will be very
palatable to others, I am going to try nonetheless. Here goes:

 

Life: The Wonderland Trail in Acadia

Traversing the trail, we encountered dense woods of birch, craggy pitch pines,
and fungi. It could be a trail anywhere in a temperate deciduous forest, except
towards the end when daylight was seen more acutely, and gentle surf heard.  An opening led us onto a giant sea of smoothly flattened granite boulders with pink inclusions dancing in the bright sunlight and stopping at the ocean’s edge.  Most fascinating of all were the tide pools. Water caught in areas of rock as the tide shifted in and out over eons of days became life’s microcosm with plants, tiny hermit crabs, and invisible life we could only hope to see.

 

Forest Life Surrounds
Until Ocean Waves Break Through
Tide pool life abounds

© Draft, Carol Labuzzetta, 2022



The inspiration for this post came from our recent trip to Maine, encompassing three days in Acadia National Park and two at Moosehead Lake in Greenville. Maine surrounds one in nature, it is everywhere you look and served as great inspiration for writing. Our travels there were detailed in posts that I made to my Medium.com site. You can view them there by clicking on this link or just seaching my name on the site.  I hope you do check them out. Thank you!

And, finally, today is Poetry Friday! Our host for the roundup is the talented Rose at her blog  Imagine the Possibilities. Thanks for hosting, Rose!