Q&A with Kimberly Ann Johnson of The Fourth Trimester

John Spalding & Kimberly Ann Johnson What made you to decide to write The Fourth Trimester? I didn’t set out to write a book, but I have been a harbinger of a message that is to speak about the unspeakable, and I realized that this information had to become common knowledge. When I was a new mother and struggling with a birth injury (although I didn’t even know that was a category), I combed Google to find holistic resources for the postpartum time. Time and again all I found were hundreds of thousands of entries on postpartum depression validating it. I couldn’t find anything on the impacts of the physical injuries and symptoms I was experiencing or what I could do about them. It was such an incredibly long healing journey for me, I wanted to write the book I never had and make it easier for other women to have all the information in one place, together with stories of women they could identify with. What is the biggest unexpected challenge new mothers face in the first three months?   We place such a high value on autonomy that most women have the ideal that if they can do everything alone during the fourth trimester, they have succeeded and are a legitimate superwoman. In fact the opposite is true, this is a time when women have to learn how to receive help or they end up isolated and lonely. It can be very challenging for high-achieving, self-sufficient women to ask for help and receive it. Another big challenge is no secret to new mothers: many relationships struggle after the baby arrives. What can couples do? Before baby arrives, couples can troubleshoot what they might anticipate as difficulties and share with each other the support they imagine they might need. They can also recommit to themselves as the center of the family unit. This book offers suggestions of ways to check in and stay connected on verbal and physical levels during this sensitive time, so that it can bring couples closer together.  Yes, it is possible to experience more intimacy with your partner through this transition.     You write that, like a lot of new mothers, you often felt depleted the three years after you had your daughter, and that you turned to exercise hoping to feel better. Instead, it always left you feeling more exhausted than energized. Finally, you found help in traditional Chinese medicine. Can you tell us about that? On the most fundamental level, recovering from childbirth requires that we preserve and replenish our life force. Because of the extenuating circumstances of my recovery (a severe birth injury, living in a new country without friends or family, breadwinning for my family, breastfeeding challenges) and without any knowledge of the physiological postpartum needs, I was severely depleted. Exercise, which would have normally given me energy, drained me. So I learned that I needed to go back to the basic foundations of deep rest and nutrient-dense, collagen-rich food so that my system had energy to build from. What does your book offer readers they won’t find elsewhere? The information on women’s experience after having babies is sparse. We go from pregnancy books galore to baby books about sleep training and raising kids- we leave out the experience of women completely. Never before has information on the physical, the emotional, the physiological, the relational, the sexual, and spiritual elements of this transition to motherhood been put together in one place in a digestible, easy-to-read practical format. What do you most hope new mothers will take from your book? I hope that new mothers understand that there is good reason for however they are feeling. If a woman is receiving advice that everything is normal (her body, her mood, her relationship) but she doesn’t feel normal, that she knows help is out there. I want women to understand the profound shift that occurs, and that this transition and the mother herself is every bit as important as the baby. The cultural adage that as long as mother and baby are alive, then it’s all good needs to be updated. We want mothers and babies to not just survive, but thrive, and this book offers the inner and outer resources for families to do just that. https://vimeo.com/231011231 Share Related Books Kimberly Johnson is a birth doula, certified Sexological Bodyworker, Somatic Experiencing practitioner, postpartum care advocate, and single mom. She is the cofounder of the STREAM School for Postpartum Care, where she trains birth professionals, bodyworkers, and somatic therapists to help women with prolapse, incontinence, painful sex, and other pelvic floor and gynecological issues. She has private practices in Encinitas and Los Angeles, CA, specializing in helping women prepare for birth, recover from birth injuries and birth trauma, and access their full sexual expression. You can find her online at www.MagaMama.com.

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Awe and Love in the New Year

by David Jaffe The Jewish calendar, like all religious systems, has particular ways of marking spiritual time. A weekly sabbath beckons us to stop, prayers for the new lunar month remind us of the constant opportunity for renewal, and the High Holy Days bring us face-to-face with our own mortality. These days are spiritual opportunities pregnant with possibility. We stand at this moment between the two most recognizable and holy days of the year—Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur. Bursting with allusions to life and death, these festivals are collectively known as the “Days of Awe,” but that description is only a half-truth. These are actually the days of Awe and Love. The balance of Awe and Love is a key to unlocking the spiritual potential of these days. For many Jews, their experience was all Awe, and its cousin, Fear. Talmudic imagery describes Rosh Hashana as the time God sits with the book of judgement open and reviews everyone’s deeds from the past year to determine who shall live and who shall die. I remember sitting in religious services as a child terrified that I might die in the coming year. Indeed, Rosh Hashana, which literally means, “Head of the Year,” is also referred to in the Bible as the "Day of Judgement." Not only that, but ten days later comes the most holy day of the year, Yom Kippur, a twenty-five hour fast that culminated these Days of Awe. To my young self, and to many Jews, these days seemed like an ordeal to get through, rather than an opportunity for profound spiritual renewal. The missing ingredient was love, and it was there all along. Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur are like two poles of a battery that exist in dynamic tension, rather than one monolithic experience of religious trembling. While Rosh Hashana is indeed Judgement Day, Yom Kippur is the "Day of At-One-Ment—a day of pure forgiveness and reconciliation. The Talmud calls Yom Kippur one of the two happiest days in the entire calendar. Two thousand years ago Yom Kippur was a great matchmaking day, when young men and women went out to the fields to meet and find their life partners, mirroring on a human plane the love and intimacy being played out on the Divine plane between God and the people. Yom Kippur is a fast day to help limited, flesh-and-blood humans get a taste of what it means to be a pure spiritual entity, without physical needs. While the day is filled with prayers for forgiveness, at one of the very first moments in the liturgy, God emphatically declares, “You are forgiven!” The rituals and poetic language of the day are designed to nurture an experience of deep connection and unconditional love. Since love is the endpoint of this ritual process, why can’t we do away with the Awe, with all its fear and judgment? The answer lies in the central image and ritual object of Rosh Hashana, the ram’s horn, or shofar. The Bible also calls Rosh Hashana the "Day of Shofar Blasts" and the liturgy, indeed, calls for no less than one hundred blasts over the course of the morning prayer service. The shofar blast is a piercing, haunting sound. While in ancient times the shofar had many uses, including calling troops to war, on Rosh Hashana the blasts are designed to evoke different kinds of tears and wailing. It is literally a voiceless cry when, facing mortality, we are left with no words. The sound of the shofar is like a baby’s cry, designed such that it cannot be ignored. We cannot ignore the blasts, and we hope that God cannot either. The shofar physically and spiritually wakes you up to take stock of your life. This is the spiritual value of Awe. Awe wakes us up, like a splash of cold water, from our spiritual slumber. Once awake, spiritual growth is possible. The key is not to stay with Awe, but to move to relationship, and Love. This is the move over the period of ten days from Rosh Hashana to Yom Kippur. Now awake, we know we have work to do. But we also know that we are deeply loved and our Divine lover is waiting for us, with a metaphoric hand stretched out yearning for us to reach as well. The Talmud and our later mystical sages teach us that this love is assured, and we just need to make the move toward closeness. This balance of Awe and Love point us in the direction of a practice for these days of spiritual opportunity. In the Jewish tradition these are also known as the Ten Days of Teshuva, or Return. This is the best time of year to affect a return to our Source and to our highest selves. These are the three steps, and they draw from both the Mussar (applied Jewish Ethics) and Chassidic (practical mysticism) schools: Step 1: Acknowledgement and Sensitivity The first step in Return is to honestly acknowledge the reality of your life. How am I living in or out of alignment with my values? Am I being my best self? Is my wife or husband correct in those things they point out about the way I behave? Have I been too defensive to really take it in? Shame and embarrassment can keep us from facing the truth of our lives. We need to work through these powerful emotions to hold with the uncomfortable truth. This step takes courage and honesty with ourselves if we are to develop the sensitivity needed to grow. Awe can help. Awe wakes us up to acknowledge reality. A solid meditation practice is a big help in this stage so we can sit with the uncomfortable feelings as we become more aware. Journaling and chanting can also help own the reality of your life. Step 2: The Power of Decision Once you have acknowledged reality, you are in a better position to decide with awareness how you actually want to live your life. This may involve ceasing or starting certain behaviors or patterns of thought. The more work you’ve done to develop exquisite sensitivity to your inner life, the easier these decisions will be. The power of decision is a valuable tool, but it can be a blunt instrument. We want to use it sparingly in the growth and return process so not to extinguish our natural passion and zest for life. Step 3: Joy and Love The most refined step in the return process is accessing the deep joy that comes with living into a sense of mission. We all have a certain mission or missions in the world, and our soul knows when it is living in alignment with these callings. Often, the unacknowledged reality of our behavior is just the thing that keeps us from joining the flow of our calling. This is the role of love. Living into our deeply felt mission brings joy to our hearts and gives us access to rich wells of love—both for ourselves and to give to others. God’s love is one way to think of this overflowing well. This is Yom Kippur—the day of reconciliation, At-One-Ment and love. We are reunited with our lover and with our path in this world. We are aligned and ready to head out into the new year. While Awe and its cousin Fear may be necessary to start a process of return, they cannot be the only guides. The great Mussar master, Rabbi Nosson Tzvi Finkel, taught that a process of return that is based only on awe and fear cannot sustain. Short-term change may take place, but it will never last. Only return motivated by love will sustain. May we merit to point ourselves toward love this Jewish High Holiday season and embark on a path of return to our highest selves, to our deep mission, and to our commitment to each other that is not only sustainable in itself, but that creates the foundations of a sustainable future for all those around us. Rabbi David Jaffe is the author of Changing the World from the Inside Out: A Jewish Approach to Personal and Social Change, winner of the 2016 National Jewish Book Award for Contemporary Jewish Life. He teaches Mussar and Jewish spiritual practice widely throughout North America and Israel. He lives in Sharon, MA, with his wife and two teenage sons. RELATED TITLES

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Shambhala Editor Dave O’Neal and Author Roger Lipsey Discuss the Legacy of Thomas Merton and His Relationship to James Fox

A Quality of Being By Dave O’Neal We talk with Roger Lipsey about his book Make Peace Before the Sun Goes Down: The Long Encounter of Thomas Merton and His Abbot, James Fox 2018 will mark the fiftieth anniversary of the death of the most famous Trappist monk of modern times—or perhaps of all time—Thomas Merton. From his life of extreme silence and seclusion he became a pioneer in the religious dialogue between East and West, a force in the intellectual and political life of his era, and a beloved spiritual writer, whose influence has only increased in the years since his death. Roger Lipsey, a Merton scholar and author of a book analyzing a particular relationship from the last two decades of Merton’s life, took the time to have a conversation with us about the relationship portrayed in the book, and also about Merton and what he continues to mean for us today. Dave O’Neal: Thomas Merton was certainly among the best known of Catholic writers of the last century, but Dom James Fox, the other subject of your book, is far less widely known. Who was he? Roger Lipsey: Dom James (1896-1987) was abbot of Our Lady of Gethsemani in central Kentucky, the large monastery where Thomas Merton had been a member of the community since 1941. Elected abbot in 1948, Don James continued in that role until a year before Merton’s death in 1968. Born to a large working class family, Irish, in a Boston suburb, young James was a brilliant student who attended Harvard College on scholarship, graduated in three years, and spent another few semesters at Harvard Business School. His burning ambition at the time was to succeed in the business world, but there was something else in him, deeply religious, touched to the core by retreats he had made with the Passionist Fathers in the Boston area. Deciding to give his life to the Church and to monastic life, he became a Passionist but within a few years felt that its public teaching mission wasn’t a good fit. He needed greater solitude, a quieter life of prayer. Transferring to the Trappist Order—Gethsemani’s Order—he soon stood out as both a man of strong religious life and a gifted organizer. He came to Gethsemani as abbot when the community was failing financially. He turned that situation around within a few years. Gethsemani became his enterprise, and it began to thrive. It also attracted, in the late 1950s and early '60s, waves of vocations—predominantly young novices, at their greatest number a little more than 250, so many that a sort of tent city had to be set up for them in the “préau,” the once tranquil central garden at the heart of the monastic complex. Why did so many hopeful men come to Gethsemani? In part, after World War II, many Catholic veterans had seen more than enough of “the world” and wanted something far different for themselves. But the strongest reason for their arrival at Gethsemani was Thomas Merton’s stunningly precocious, brilliantly written memoir of his own path to monastic life: The Seven Story Mountain. Merton was a literary artist, a free and vastly creative spirit voluntarily subsumed to strict monastic discipline. Dom James was in many respects a nineteenth-century abbot, strict and traditional. They were destined to clash, seriously so, though they were also capable of cooperating on some issues of common interest, notably the education of the novices, for which Dom James made Merton responsible. DO: How did you first become interested in Thomas Merton yourself? RL: In 1982 I visited the Thomas Merton Center and Gethsemani for the first time, drawn by Merton’s abstract brush drawings and print. They were unstudied, even ignored—a few were used here and there as illustrations in new editions of his books. It took years more for me to turn toward writing Angelic Mistakes: The Art of Thomas Merton, for you, sir—for Shambhala. But by then my life had changed. I had joined Merton in the zone of convergence. It was no longer only his visual art that mattered to me; it was his entire realization of the life of search, of a spirituality that is sure enough of itself and of its direction to welcome uncertainty, to welcome others. DO: The relationship between Merton and Dom James has long been known to be complicated, but you were able to chronicle the complications in a kind of detail that hadn’t happened before—did you have access to materials other scholars hadn’t yet seen? RL: Yes, masses of archival material in two categories: already available but unstudied, and newly available through the kindness and trust of the current abbot of Gethsemani. Historians are archive people—archives are their joy because history or biography is strewn in archives, at best summarily ordered, probably unknown and in no particular order. You strive to assemble a coherent and true life story from, let’s say, debris left behind. You have to question the material, follow connections where they lead, let the story dissolve and re-form a number of times over as the material shows what it needs to be. The Merton archive at the Thomas Merton Center, Bellarmine University, Louisville, Kentucky, is a model of order—but so vast that much material in it remains to be studied and interpreted. The archives at the abbey itself, crucial to this book, were at the time of writing less well ordered but still entirely usable, deeply interesting. DO: The book contains a very striking frontispiece illustration. Can you describe it, and say something about what it reveals about both Merton and Dom James? RL: The frontispiece is an early page of a new Merton book (The Sign of Jonas, 1953) on which both Merton and Dom James wrote dedicatory words to a Trappist abbot in Canada, whom they both knew and obviously respected. The character of each man is evident on that page: Merton’s handwriting light and modest, expressing in French his “religious and filial homage in Our Lady,” Dom James’s handwriting expressing vigorously in English his “gratitude, affection, and assurance of our continual prayer.” But then there is something more from Dom James, a stamp he often added to his communications, just like the stamps we use for Air Mail or a return address. It reads: “All for Jesus, Thru Mary, with a Smile.” This was Dom James, a man of simple, direct, unintellectual faith. Within a few months of his abbacy, Merton had privately joked in his journal that he was going around the monastery with a smile. DO: Merton was an unusual monk in many ways: a man vowed to the silent life who carried on an exhaustive correspondence with some of the great figures of his time; a hermit with an amazing number of friends. How unusual was he among Trappists of his era? RL: Father Louis—as Merton was known across the Trappist world—was unique. There were writers and scholars in the Order; I’m thinking particularly of Fr. Chrysogonus Waddell (1930–2008), a widely respected musicologist and composer to whom Gethsemani owes many of its utterly beautiful “psalm tone” chants that are heard there daily. But there was no second Merton. His brilliant witness to the life of prayer, of intelligent sacrifice, of life as a Way that grips us but also raises us, remains for all to read, a source of inspiration. My book offers a fair amount of comment on where to look for Merton at his best in his autobiographical memoirs, his journal, correspondence (remarkable!), essays, and more. DO: Can you give some idea of the breadth of Merton’s interests—in the social, religious, artistic, theological, or literary realms—during the period covered in the book? RL: Oh my . . . He belonged to so many different worlds, contributed to so many different worlds. He was remarkable, and prescient, on the future of monasticism. He was a Western pioneer, recognized and befriended by D.T. Suzuki on Zen and its commonalities with Christianity. He was a fast friend of the Berrigan brothers, particularly of Dan Berrigan, in the anti-war movement of the 1960s, and he was regarded by the Berrigans and others in the movement as their spiritual counsel, their rudder in rough seas. He had a strong and searching prayer life structured initially around the insights of St. John of the Cross, the sixteenth-century mystic and monastic, and later a prayer and contemplative life that owed much to Zen. “How I pray is breathe,” he once wrote in the mid-1960s. And then, he explored the hermit life, argued for it from ancient Trappist lives and texts, and eventually lived it in his famous hermitage in the woods at Gethsemani. And then, and then. . . There is really so much. I should mention that in the early to mid 60s he explored abstract art through brush drawings and prints. Shambhala published my study of that aspect of Merton’s creative work: Angelic Mistakes: The Art of Thomas Merton. I’m happy to report here that Echo Point Books will soon republish that book. DO: What was the Merton of the Dom James years (1950s and 60s) like—compared to the Merton so many have encountered in his best-selling memoir The Seven Story Mountain? RL: You could say that there were three periods in Merton’s life and works. The Seven Storey Mountain, published in 1948 and a bestseller, crowned and completed the first period. Through those years he was somewhat ascetic, strongly, strongly Catholic, and a marvelously gifted witness to his own life in all of its breadth and emotions. In the mid-1950s, he responded willingly to pressure from Dom James and James’s superior in the Order in Europe to write much less and to adhere to properly Catholic topics intended for that community’s readers. Broadly speaking, the published works of that middle period are restrained; one hardly knows that Merton is their author. But his correspondence and private journal in those years remain immensely vital and searching. The third period, from about 1961 to his untimely death in 1968, is, so to speak, “my Merton,” and I hope yours. He is so interesting, so searching, so free of mind but religiously grounded, so centered in his poetic and interpretive abilities as an author. Wherever one looks—in essays, the journal, correspondence, elsewhere—he is a paradigmatic seeker, thinker, explorer of our shared reality and its innate spiritual dimensions. DO: Can the relationship between Merton and Dom James be seen to symbolize something bigger than both men? Of course one can see the conflict between a Roman Catholicism that clung hard to tradition versus the openness that was happening in the wake of the Second Vatican Council, but is there a symbolism even greater, more “cosmic” than that? RL: I think you’re right about this. The drama between them isn’t limited to “Catholics then,” or “the Church,” or any imaginable boundary. It is the drama of an immensely creative, searching—and, on occasion, undisciplined—spirit encountering limits set again and again by traditional, conservative attitudes and regulations. Merton’s path toward himself is a sign to us all. DO: To what degree do you believe that Merton and Dom James were reconciled by the time of Merton’s death? Was there a sincere sort of healing that took place or was it more like “making nice” once they were no longer locked in a relationship of obedience? RL: What to say here? They were both monks, both committed to the Cistercian way—and they knew that. That was a bond between them. On the other hand, Dom James’s endless restrictions on Merton were onerous, and Merton knew that, detested that. In all the years of Dom James’s abbacy, Merton was permitted to leave the monastery for more than one day on, I think, three occasions (apart from hospital stays). Yet he was justly in demand around the world. Dom James stood in the way. DO: Do you believe Merton would have remained a monk all of his days, had his life not been cut so tragically short?  RL: As I write toward the end of my book, Merton had discussed with Trungpa Rinpoche, then young, in Delhi, the possibility of cofounding a monastery of a new kind, dedicated to meditation, profoundly inter-religious, and profoundly serious. Perhaps in the American southwest. I believe he would have moved toward that. Would he have remained a Cistercian monk and priest? I must say, I hope so: it suited him, it was a perfect identity for this man of immense good will and sensibility. DO: How would you characterize Merton’s legacy, from the perspective now of half a century after his death?  RL: I don’t feel that it matters so much anymore whether one is Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, Buddhist, Muslim—and so on. What matters now is how one goes about it, how deeply it is felt, how one acts in relation to it, what inner identity it helps one to nurture and realize over time. There is a convergence, as one of my closest friends puts it, and in that zone of convergence it’s not labels and dogmas that matter, and it’s certainly not passionate advocacy. It is quality: quality of being, quality of action toward others, quality of wisdom and common sense intertwined. Merton already occupied that zone of convergence in his later years. In effect, he waits for us there.

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Christianity’s Best-Kept Secret: Cynthia Bourgeault and The Cloud of Unknowing

Cynthia Bourgeault introduces readers to The Cloud of Unknowing, a Christian mystical classic that inspired Centering Prayer and contemplative practice.

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Haiku: A Reader’s Guide

Learn all about haiku, from its traditional Japanese origins to its concise poetry that captures nature, fleeting moments, and the beauty of everyday life. Many know haiku as a three-line poem, the first and last lines five syllables long, and the second line, seven. But there is much more to what defines haiku, elements more subtle than prescribed syllable counts or line breaks. In fact, Japanese haiku are typically written in a single column, and many haiku deviate from the syllable count familiar to so many of us. So, what then, makes a haiku a haiku? Demonstrated throughout the haiku tradition is a close relationship to nature, and thus seasonal references are usually present. However, haiku also maintains a certain openness to interpretation, and this is the aspect of haiku with which many writers new to the tradition struggle. There is so much complexity to the seemingly simple art of haiku and its history, and the books in this guide, by translators and editors with a deep respect for the art, enlighten readers to a rich cultural tradition, leaving a delightful appreciation for the unique poetic form. Also see our Reader's Guide to Buddhist Poetry. See Product Narrow Road to the Interior and Other Writings by Matsuo Bashō, translated by Sam Hamill A classic by influential haiku master, Matsuo Bashō, Narrow Road to the Interior recounts the seventeenth-century writer’s travels through northern Japan, written in haibun, a form consisting of linked prose and haiku. Translator Sam Hamill offers, in his introduction, insight into Bashō’s life, travels, and influences, particularly his Zen training, as well as studies in Shintō, Taoism, and Confucianism. Also included in this collection are Bashō’s Travelogue of Weather-Beaten Bones, The Knapsack Notebook, and Sarashina Travelogue. More than two hundred collected haiku are also featured, with the original Japanese provided, which Hamill advises readers not to ignore: “The Western reader, accustomed to being conscious of reading translation and having fallen into the unrewarding habit of reading poetry silently, often misses Bashō’s ear by neglecting the romaji or romanized Japanese printed with the poems. Onomatopoeia, rhyme, and slant rhyme are Bashō’s favorite tools, and he uses them like no one else in Japanese literature” (xxiii). See Product Spring of My Life and Selected Haiku by Kobayashi Issa, translated by Sam Hamill, illustrated by Kaji Aso Another of Japan’s most notable haiku masters, Kobayashi Issa, who lived about one hundred years after Bashō, believed in poetry as a path to enlightenment. Over his life, his dedicated spiritual poetry practice yielded more than twenty thousand haiku, in addition to other forms of poetry. His most well-known work, Spring of My Life is also written in the haibun form favored by Bashō in his travelogues, and recounts a year of Issa’s life, a life marked by loss, poverty, and illness. Hamill’s introduction provides this biographical context, as well as notes on reading and translating haiku. Also included are more than one hundred and fifty collected haiku, with original Japanese provided in romaji. See Product Art of Haiku Its History through Poems and Paintings by Japanese Masters by Stephen Addiss What many people do not know about the haiku tradition is its inclusion of visual art--often, creators of haiku create paintings or calligraphy, haiga, to accompany and enhance the verse. This book presents numerous full-color examples of these haiga, as it delves into the evolution and history of the haiku tradition, from the form’s foundational masters to contemporary times. Haiga do not simply illustrate what is expressed in the corresponding haiku, but contributes to its meaning, and vice-versa. Like its haiku counterpart, haiga possesses an aesthetic marked by simplicity, nature, and engagement with the viewer. See Product A White Tea Bowl 100 Haiku from 100 Years of Life by Mitsu Suzuki Illustrating a dedicated Zen practice, the loneliness of widowhood, and a deep gratitude for life, the one hundred haiku collected in A White Tea Bowl offer a tender glimpse into the life of Mitsu Suzuki, late widow of Shunryu Suzuki Roshi. The collection’s title is inspired by one of Suzuki’s most poignant compositions reflecting on widowhood: Bōfu mede shi hakuji jawan ni shincha kumu I pour shinchainto the white porcelaintea bowl he loved (50). In addition to the haiku, a biographical introduction by Zen priest Norman Fischer and a collection of anecdotes from close friends and students of Suzuki reveal a warm and resilient woman whose wisdom made a lasting impression on those fortunate to have known her. See Product Haiku Mind 108 Poems to Cultivate Awareness and Open Your Heart by Patricia Donegan The magic of haiku is that it represents a moment of fully present awareness. Recognizing haiku’s ability to bring us into the present, Patricia Donegan presents 108 haiku from a diverse array of poets, adding commentary on the themes therein, to create a book of poetic meditations that help to cultivate what Donegan calls “haiku mind.” Recalling her first experience of haiku mind, Donegan writes “I stopped in mid-air as I saw the orange in afternoon sunlight by my plate. The light was golden and the orange perfectly round. All was perfect as it was, and I felt suddenly and totally at peace as I saw ‘the thing itself’ as it was in its nakedness without my overlay of thoughts or opinions, and tears rolled down my face” (xxii). While this collection focuses on the contemplative quality of haiku, Donegan provides brief biographical notes on the poets to provide some cultural and historical context. See Product The Pocket Haiku translated by Sam Hamill Perfect for on-the-go reading, The Pocket Haiku offers a selection of more than two hundred haiku, in addition to a brief introduction providing biographical and cultural context. Hamill notes that “too much haiku is merely haiku. Haiku written in American English and attempting to borrow traditional Japanese literary devices usually ends up smelling of the bric-a-brac shop, all fragmentary dust and mold or cheap glitter coating the ordinary, or--worse--the merely cute or contrived. Great haiku cuts both ways, sometimes witty or sarcastic, sometimes making Zenlike demands for that most extraordinary consciousness, no-mind or ordinary-mind” (xiii-xiv). Thus, most of the haiku in this collection are composed by the three great masters, Bashō, Buson, and Issa. Additional haiku by a variety of other Japanese poets are also included. See Product One Hundred Frogs From Renga to Haiku to English by Hiroaki Sato One of the most interesting aspects of haiku is its origins in the collaborative renga, or linked-verse. To understand haiku, one must first understand renga. A sort of poetic game of wit, “a renga consists of two to a hundred alternating parts of 5-7-5 and 7-7 syllables, usually written by two or more persons, with the linking made in such a way that any two consecutive parts must make an intelligible whole, but three may not” (3). An in-depth book ideal for students of poetry and translation, One Hundred Frogs traces the history of renga and its evolution to haiku, and explores the art of translating these works. More than one hundred different English translations of a single haiku by Bashō illuminate just how many possibilities and approaches exist for translators. Also included are modern Japanese and Western haiku, as an illustration of the form’s versatility and continued evolution. Whether reading or writing haiku, the experience can be profound. As Stephen Addiss explains in his introduction to The Art of Haiku, “the purpose of haiku was to use the mundane while exceeding the mundane, to discover a moment of oneness in the diverse or to discern multiplicity in the singular. Haiku can find an inner truth from an outward phenomenon, and ultimately use words to go beyond words” (3). This “moment of oneness” is the true charm of haiku, and likely the reason why the form and its tradition has persisted to this day. by Lindsay Michko Love Haiku Japanese Poems of Yearning, Passion, and Remembrance translated and edited by Patricia Donegan, with Yoshie Ishibashi While haiku are traditionally focused on nature, the form allows for deep emotional expression as well, as demonstrated by this collection of haiku by classic and modern Japanese poets. One of the keys to the haiku aesthetic, heavily influenced by Zen, is impermanence, which is perhaps why these haiku prove so evocative--anyone who has experienced love can attest that it is as impermanent as a springtime blossom. In the haiku tradition this aesthetic recognition of the impermanent is referred to as mono no aware. The haiku presented here poignantly evoke the feelings of yearning, passion, and remembrance that arise from the impermanence of love.

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The Art of Haiku

From the introduction to The Art of Haiku: Its History through Poems and Paintings by Japanese Masters This book will trace the history of Japanese haiku, including the poetic traditions from which it was born, primarily through the work of leading masters such as Basho, Buson, Issa, and Shiki, along with a number of other fine poets. Although they are less well-known, haiku cal­ligraphy and haiku-paintings (haiga) of the masters will also be illustrated and discussed as vital elements in the art of haiku. Theory and criticism will be minimized in favor of presenting the works themselves, which were composed to create a spontaneous interconnection with their readers and viewers, who play a vital part in the expressive process. What Are Haiku? Although today haiku may be the best-known form of poetry in the world, there is still confusion as to how to define them. Many people would de­scribe haiku as a three-line poem of 5–7–5 syllables, but this does not pen­etrate more than the surface of this remarkable form of poetry. Rather than tight definitions, it might be more useful to discuss the guidelines that most haiku follow. Haiku in Japan are generally written or printed in a single column. Nev­ertheless, until the twentieth century, most traditional Japanese examples fall into 5–7–5 syllable patterns, although this was stretched and even broken by some of the great masters when it suited their purpose.1 In the past one hun­dred years, Japanese haiku poets have been divided between those who basi­cally follow 5–7–5, and those who do not. Furthermore, haiku poets in otherlanguages often ignore this guideline. For example, the great majority of fine haiku in English have fewer than seventeen syllables because English is more compact than Japanese, and the same is true of haiku in other languages as well (see the appendix for more information on syllable counts in Japanese and English). If haiku do not always depend upon a fixed syllable pattern, what are their most important characteristics? One is closeness to nature, which sup­plies most of the images that the poems rely upon to convey their mean­ings. This usually involves concrete observations expressed briefly and clearly through the use of everyday language and a syntax that is natural rather than “poetic.” Since in Japanese language the verb is usually at the end of the sentence, this sometimes involves the translator with changes in word order, but the guidelines remain the same. Here is a view of nature by Basho that finds the extraordinary in the ordinary: fuyu niwa ya              garden in winter— tsuki mo ito naru      the moon also becomes a thread mushi no gin             in the insect’s song The second characteristic of haiku are references to a particular season; these references are called kigo. In Japanese, the great majority of traditional haiku indicate spring, summer, autumn, or winter, either directly (as in the haiku above) or through images that suggest which season is being pre­sented. Some of these references may seem arbitrary, but they are firmly fixed into haiku history. To give just a few of many possible examples, frogs, swallows, warblers, the hazy moon, late frost, and plum- or cherry-blos­soms are all indicators of spring, while for summer there are short nights, herons, toads, lilies, duckweed, and hail. Fall includes the harvest moon, lightning, dew, deer, grasshoppers, dragonflies, and persimmons, while winter is indicated by snow, frost, ice, owls, ducks, fallen leaves, and bare trees.2 Therefore a Japanese haiku that mentions a frog is understood as a spring poem, while one including a heron is understood as taking place in summer. Since the season adds to the mood and meaning of the poem, these references are significant. Third, and most important, haiku suggest rather than define their mean­ings, leaving much of the process up to the reader or listener. In effect, the audience joins the writer in completing the poem, and since most haiku have more than one possible meaning, they tend not to have “correct” or solitary interpretations. Here the brevity of the form is helpful; the fewer the words, the more potential for multiple implications. As we shall see, the ear­lier poetic form called tanka (five-line poems with 5–7–5–7–7 syllable count) tended to be more explicit, while haiku allow readers to become partners to the poet by personally responding to the images. Of course, all art is an expe­rience rather than an object—the poem, music, or painting is merely the in­stigator of that experience—but in haiku this interactive aspect is especially important. Too much information would be limiting; like the inside of a glass or cup, it is the empty space that is most valuable. In haiku these spaces can take the form of grammatical ellipses, so one may often find incomplete sentences, which allow meanings to emerge rather than being insisted upon. For the same reason, most haiku are not directly subjective. Instead, an objective description of nature, often with a contrasting element, can allow readers more opportunities to engage with the poem, perhaps supplying their own subjective experiences. The description may contain an element of surprise, mystery, or humor, but it is usually based on fresh, specific im­agery with an intense focus. Yet a fine haiku is seldom purely objective, since it has to resonate with human experience. It may give the appear­ance of being spontaneous, and perhaps it was, but poets like Basho and Santoka also considered and sometimes altered their verses over a period of time. The purpose of haiku was to use the mundane while exceeding the mundane, to discover a moment of oneness in the diverse or to discern multiplicity in the singular. Haiku can find an inner truth from an outward phenomenon, and ultimately use words to go beyond words.

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Jalaluddin Rumi : Persia's Greatest Mystic Poet

Discover Jalaluddin Rumi, the Persian Sufi mystic poet, his life, spiritual journey, and lasting influence on Sufism and Persian literature.

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Ramakrishna on Weeping for God

Who Weeps for God? People shed a whole jug of tears for wife and children. They swim in tears for money. But who weeps for God? Cry to Him with a real cry. Longing is like the rosy dawn. After the dawn out comes the sun. Longing is followed by the vision of God. God reveals Himself to a devotee who feels drawn to Him by the combined force of these three attractions: the attraction of worldly possessions for the worldly man, the child's attraction for its mother, and the husband's attraction for the chaste wife. If one feels drawn to him by the combined force of these three attractions, then one can attain him. The point is to love God even as the mother loves her child, the chaste wife her husband, and the worldly man his wealth. Join together these three forces of love, these three powers of attraction, and direct them all to God. Then you will certainly see him. It is necessary to pray to Him with a longing heart. The kitten knows only how to call its mother, crying, "Mew, mew!" It remains satisfied wherever its mother puts it. And the mother cat puts the kitten sometimes in the kitchen, sometimes on the floor, and sometimes on the bed. When it suffers it cries only, "Mew, mew!" That's all it knows. But as soon as the mother hears this cry, wherever she may be, she comes to the kitten. -Ramakrishna ANDREW HARVEY TITLES

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