February 1, 2009 - Haiku Workshop at CSULB Japanese Garden

back row: Phyllis Collins, Alvin Thomas Ethington, Sharon Hawley, Margaret Hehman-Smith, Kraig Keeler
front row: Deborah P Kolodji, Janis Lukstein, Kathabela Wilson, Michael Angerman, Wendy Wright
not shown: Victor P Gendrano, Kendall Evans

The Southern California Haiku Study Group held a haiku workshop and ginko walk at the Earl Burns Miller Japanese Garden at California State University, Long Beach on Sunday, February 1, 2009. The theme was haiku context.

We met in the Friendship Garden, a private meeting area adjacent to the garden. Wendy Wright read from Blyth translations of classical Japanese haiku and from Fay Aogayi's books, Chrysanthemum Love and In Borrowed Shoes.

Each table had a copy of Chiyo-Ni: Woman Haiku Master by Patricia Donegan and Yoshie Ishibashi, as well as a copy of Einstein's Century by Akito Arima. We read and discussed about a dozen examples from each book.

After a short break, we read the section on context from Lee Gurga's book, Haiku, A Poet's Guide, discussing all of his example haiku. Then, Debbie spoke a bit about ginko walks and we went out to the garden to walk and write.

Afterwards, we reconvened to share what we had written and to critique those haiku participants wanted to offer up for in-depth critique. We hope to start a tradition of an annual workshop at the Japanese Garden.