LYNX XXVI:1, February, 20110

. . . This is to let you know that my " our blue bag" tanka is currently in the Prize Round ofThe Poetry Ark Prize project at poetryark.org, and AHA Books is credited as publisher. The writers and publishers of the top 3 poems are eligible for over $2,000 in prizes. ( Note that this year-long contest was advertised in Poets & Writers) All The Best, Darrell Lindsey

Are you back in the northern woods? I hope the autumn days are sunny, and the night fires warm. It is 9c today, rain falling out of a grey sky, evening is coming on.
I have been busy, trying to trim up a pamphlet competition entry that will, of course, win me fame and fortune. The seasonal tanka that appeared in four separate issues of Lynx I have entered as SEASONAL NOTES, each season with its own page. There have been a few changes, not many, a word here and there. I hope this is OK, and I acknowledge their first appearances in LYNX. I am also entering CUPID'S ARROWS ARE COFFIN NAILS as it appeared in LYNX. As I was working got to thinking, "Isn't it about time...” I tapped up, first, the last issue of LYNX, to see the old number; then tapped up the current issue. I have only given it a quick look-see, will get to it in detail before much longer. My wife- bless her - is in the kitchen making supper preparation sounds. A little later it is bath time for me, which is more complicated than the simple word "bath.” I have to go from wheel chair to bath chair, and.........and......and so on. Tomorrow is training where I will be under the hand of MY blond therapist. Don Ammons

Canada-Japan Literary Awards go to
Masako Fukawa, Stanley Fukawa and Janick Belleau

Ottawa, October 25, 2010 – The Canada Council for the Arts announced today the winners of the 2010 Canada-Japan Literary Awards. The English-language winning work is Spirit of the Nikkei Fleet: BC’s Japanese Canadian Fishermen, a 130 year history written by Masako Fukawa with Stanley Fukawa, of Burnaby, B.C. The French-language winning work is D’âmes et d’ailes / of souls and wings, a collection of tanka in French and English by Janick Belleau of Longueuil, Que. Read the complete news release here or by copying and pasting the following URL into your web browser’s address bar: www.canadacouncil.ca/news/releases/2010/gh129322599811263515.htm
Images of the winners and their books can be downloaded from the Canada Council image gallery.

. . . New Year! I was surprised to see more than 130 hits in my blog where I upload one translated haiku by Japanese contemporary haiku poets per day(http://fayaoyagi.wordpress.com) on New Year's Day (still early here in rainy SF!). I also manage to twitter one haiku per day since November, 2010! (Twitter handle name: faysftsuyaku).My high-tech client laughed when I told him I 'copy' haiku I twittered in Facebook for my non-twitter friends! Fay Aoyagi

Dear family and friends,

I hope you are happy, well, and enjoying this holiday season. Although much of the rest of the country (and Europe) has already experienced snow and cold, here in southeast New Jersey it was unseasonably warm for much of November. Now, as we approach the Winter Solstice, an Arctic chill is with us. Tonight, stars blaze in the clear depths of the sky.

I continue to enjoy living here in the South Jersey shore area. Of course I miss Bill, but being close to my daughter and son-in-law, Nancy and John, and family (Courtney 10, Conor, 7) really helps. I love being part of my grandkids' lives---they are growing up so fast. Both are excellent students. Courtney is a fine goalie on a traveling soccer team, and a talented singer and dancer. She's also a voracious reader. Conor is reading chapter books, playing soccer and basketball, and enjoying his first year in Cub Scouts.

I'm also in frequent touch with my son Charlie and his wife Ellen, and with Bill's daughter Beth and her family (husband Branin, Will, 22, and Alex,17). Will graduates from Wesleyan this year, with a degree in computer science and math, and Alex graduates from Westtown Friends School. In the fall, he's heading for Warren Wilson College in North Carolina.

My children and grandchildren bless my life in many ways, and I'm very grateful. I'm happy to report that everyone is doing well.

Also, last June I enjoyed a visit in the Texas Hill Country with my sister and her husband. Darie and Roger are in an RV lifestyle, and I spent a week with them in a beautiful RV park, plus had the opportunity to briefly visit with my niece and nephew, Betsy and John. I hadn't seen my sister since shortly after Bill died.

Locally, since last February, I've been attending the meetings of "H.O.P.E," an area widows and widowers organization that functions as both a support and social group. Within the group I've found lovely new friends. I've also enjoyed getting to know several area poets better and made a few good friends here in my condo development.

Two professional highlights this fall were my being invited to read at the Geraldine R. Dodge 2010 Poetry Festival, and having a poem mounted on the Scott and Hella McVay Poetry Trail at D & R Greenway Nature Center in Princeton. It was an honor and a joy to participate in the dedication of that Trail.

And Recycling Starlight, my small book of poems charting my grief during the first eighteen months after Bill's death was published this past fall by Mountains and Rivers Press in Eugene, Oregon.

Finally, some of you already know that I had a total hysterectomy on October 28th. I am deeply blessed that the results of that surgery have rendered me totally cancer-free, with no need for any further treatment. My oncologist / surgeon said, "That's what happens when we find it so early." I am recovering amazingly well and give thanks daily for this miracle.

If you'd like to keep up with my poetry and occasional personal news, I invite you to visit my blog now and then: http://penhart.wordpress.com.

I'd love to hear from any of you with whom I've not been in touch for a while. May the coming year---and beyond---be filled with light, love, and joy for you and yours.

Love,
Penny Harter

. . . Please let me introduce myself to you. I am a Brazilian who has spent most of his time working in physical sciences; though since an early age I had been very much attracted to arts, in all its forms. I studied piano for 15 years and read extensively about painting, poetry, architecture, and even perfumes. About one year ago, I started reading poetry seriously. About one month ago, I start writing it myself, especially in the haiku format. I bought your book recently from Amazon (Enjoying haiku...), and have appreciated it very much. Congratulations for such an enlightening work! I am really serious about haiku and other oriental poetry genres because I believe they capture the very essence of arts, namely the synergy between truth and surprise through the creative use of sparing words. If you allow me, I have enclosed below a dozen of my own haiku. I would be delighted to receive eventual comments and criticisms. Please be very frank. Would you recommend some specific journal where I could submit them? Very best wishes, Luciano Costa

. . . I'm very pleased to have the ghazals appear in the February issue. And I'm certainly interested in hearing about your trip to Tokyo, as well as Jane's address at the meeting of the International Pen-Club. Will she have updates posted on her blog? Thank you again for your very kind response. Sincerely, Steffen Horstmann
JR: Thanks for asking! The report is written and is just waiting for a good day for me to do the proof-reading.

. . .A haiku writer and weblog friend calls ours, this new world we are intensely uncovering, a “haikuverse”. I call the seeds of haiku spinning in its firmament the “hai-xies”. We’re inventing every cloud in it and invoke moody winds for the haiku we write, yet still constantly wondering until read so or not if our ku is at all a haiku. The intensity to write a haiku that works for me gets deeper it seems when one or a suite I submit is rejected without a word if but one as to why. Editors and “masters” tell us ‘novices’ to read, read and read. I’ve been doing that. One that has helped me understand what I’m doing really is Jane’s online lectures and the video of hers I once watched. In it she presents a “haiku world” that seems easier to understand. (By the way, this is late but I would like to congratulate her on her being guest speaker at the 76th International Pen Congress in Tokyo.) In fact, at the Vancouver Haiku Group’s last meeting (we formed into a group of five for now, recently), we invoked her words in one discussion where she says in one of her videos that “if you think it is a ‘haiku', then it is a ‘haiku’.” The smoothened our tight foreheads and lit our eyes. Why not indeed?I also added that, it seems to me, Jane embraces a global understanding of haiku, meaning how language shapes not only language as an expression but the nuances of words—nuances that rise as indiscernible as mist from the culture of its birthing. This is how I feel about my writing especially about haiku. I do strive to go by the rules but often, what comes into shape breaks the rules, I believe, and finds its own flow. Still, I have a few that have since been successful, meaning accepted by editors. Your generous acceptance of my LYNX submissions and that you were the first ever who said my lines are those of a poet, has set me on solid ground. And like home, I do keep coming back. As always with deep thanks, Alegria Imperial

. . .The following renga (A Collection of Days) was our first collaboration together. Jean (Jean Brasseur) and I workshop together at Wild Poetry Forum together and both have a love of the short forms. Recently, Wild was down for maintenance for a couple of days and Jean had the idea of trying our hand at a renga. We were so in-sync with each other, and it came together so beautifully, that we wanted to share it with you and Jane. We hope you are inspired by it and find it worthy of publication in your February issue of LYNX. If not, we just hope you enjoy the read! stacey dye

Hamburg, den 8. September 2010, Liebe Freunde und Haikufreunde, in diesen Tagen erscheint im Wiesenburg Verlag mein Debütband Taubenschlag. Kurzlyrik und Kurzprosa. Eine Sammlung meiner gelungensten Haiku, Tanka, Sequenzen und Kurzprosa der vergangenen acht Jahre mit einem Nachwort von Annika Reich. Es ist gebunden, hat 110 Seiten und kostet 14,90 Euro. Das Buch kann portofrei direkt beim Verlag oder beim Buchhandel, selbstverständlich auch über den Online-Versandhandel bestellt werden. Ich habe gestern bereits einige Autorenexemplare erhalten und biete hiermit signierte Bücher an, solange mein Vorrat reicht. Ebenfalls portofrei zum Ladenpreis. Eine eMail an mich, die die Postanschrift enthält, genügt. Es grüßt herzlich. Udo Wenzel

ukiaHaiku festival and competition listing
Ukiah is a northern California town whose name, backwards, spells “haiku.” In 2011 the City of Ukiah will hold its ninth annual competition and festival. The competition encourages local, national, and international submissions to the Jane Reichhold International Prize category.
Website Address:                              www.ukiahaiku.org
Fee:                                                  $5 for up to three haiku
Limit:                                      Maximum 3 haiku per person
                                                                         (only 1 haiku/person/category may win an award)
Eligibility:                                          Age 19 and over
Start date for submissions:              Saturday, January 1, 2011
Postmark Deadline                            Friday, March 18, 2011
Festival Ceremony                            Sunday, May 1, 2011 (announcement of winners)
Submission Guidelines
If submitting via the online form:
1) On or after January 1, 2011, go to www.ukiahaiku.org, click on "submit your haiku" and then "the online form." Follow instructions on the form.
2) If our PayPal payment form is live by then, you can send your payment electronically. Otherwise, send the fee (US check or international money order) by snail mail to ukiaHaiku festival, PO Box 865, Ukiah, CA 95482. Clearly indicate the author's name of the haiku submission for which the payment is intended.
If submitting via snail mail:
1) On or after January 1, 2011, go to www.ukiahaiku.org, click on "submit your haiku" and then "the printed form (pdf)"; download the form. Follow instructions on the form. Mail along with your fee.
Deadline: Friday, March 11, 2011 (postmark or email date)
Judging: Jane Reichhold will judge the Jane Reichhold International Prize category. Awards: $100 first place, $50 second place, $25 third place, plus a booklet of winning poems.
Festival and Awards Ceremony: Sunday, May 1, 2011, 2 p.m. Winners are strongly encouraged to attend the festival to read their poems (winners will be contacted in advance of the festival date). Out-of-towners might consider visiting the many world-class tourist destinations surrounding Ukiah--inland wine country and redwood forests, or the Mendocino Coast (a 1-1/2 hour drive from Ukiah) before or after the festival.

In the September issue of BlueBerry Haiku, a magazine of poetry for children there was a page of bookmarks with illustrations from Allison Bruce and D. Diorio to four of Jane Reichhold’s haiku. Gisele LeBlanc, editor offers the page for download and printing for any who wish to have the bookmarks. You will find the page at:

Allison Bruce has a Bachelor’s of Science degree in Chemistry from the University of California, Davis, in addition to design, illustration, and animation studies at the Academy of Art University, San Francisco. Currently working as a scientific illustrator and animator in the bay area, her work has been published by several journals, including "Cell,” "Nature Biotechnology,” and "Cancer Cell.”Allison is an associate member of the Society of Children’s Book Writers & Illustrators. D. Diorio’s illustrations have been featured in Crow Toes Quarterly, Berry Blue Haiku, Bedtime Story, and on Guardian Angel Kids online ezine. Her art lessons have been published in Pack-O-Fun’s Art Smarts feature, and on Hot Chalks Lesson Page, Schooldays Magazine, K12 Academics, Kinderarts.com, and Artsonia. An art teacher and professional artist, D. Diorio is a member of the Society for Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators, the Children’s Literature Connection, and education society Kappa Delta Pi. Visit her website at: http://ddiorio.itgo.com

mango moons
Muse India,www.museindia.com an online literary journal, is seeking submissions in contemporary haiku, tanka and haibun from around the world. mango moons - would go online on 1st May 2011 Original, unpublished haiku, tanka and haibun, not under consideration elsewhere, are welcome from all writers. Please send submissions of 5-10 haiku poems and / or 5 -10 tanka poems,
and / or 2 to 3 haibun for our perusal. Do send your work, duly edited. India is awakening to the world of haiku, tanka and haibun and we would love to showcase your best work in this special edition.
Please note:Submissions are only open from 1st February to 15th March 2011
Email submissions are encouraged. Type "Muse India" in the subject line, and do include a short 50 word bio & a jpg photo of yours (optional), in your submission mail.
Please type your haiku, tanka and haibun in the body of the message, formatted as plain text. Attachments will not be opened. Email submissions should be sent to kalaramesh8 [at] gmail [dot] com (please replace [at] and [dot] with proper symbols before sending
Muse India retains first rights, meaning that if your work is subsequently published elsewhere, Muse India must be cited as the original place of publication
Once your work has been accepted, we reserve the right to publish the chosen poems, in online issue and in the print journal of Muse India.Keenly looking forward to reading your lovely work, and please do pass the word around :) Warmly, Surya Rao
Managing Director, Muse India and Kala Ramesh Editor of mango moons, Muse India

Dear Roadrunner Reader, Issue X:3 (October 2010) is now up:
http://www.roadrunnerjournal.net/ Featuring:The Scorpion Prize #21 by Tom Raworth, ku, "Peggy Willis Lyles: A Celebration, "Tada Chimako's Haiku" by Hiroaki Sato, —Tom Raworth: An Interview Thanks for reading, and please do pass this email on to others. Scott Metz

ON THE MUSE-PIE PRESS SITE, Issue #2, SHOT GLASS JOURNALOur new online poetry journal of short poetryEDITED BY MARY-JANE GRANDINETTIShot Glass Journal Issue #2 features a special New Zealand poetry section and an international collection of poetry from Hong kong, Italy, the Netherlands, Puerto Rico, the UK, and the US. The wide range of poems includes Free Verse poetry and poetic forms such as ekphrastic, the Ghazal, Pi-archimedes, and prose poetry.Go to www.musepiepress.com and click on Shot Glass Journal in the left margin.
CHECK US OUT AND ENJOY THE POETRY Submissions for The Fib Review are now being accepted for Issue #8 which will be posted at the end of December, 2010.Submissions for Shot Glass Journal are now being accepted for Issue #3 which will be posted at the end of January, 2011. 30th Anniversary of Muse-Pie Press 1980-2010

The new issue of cho is now available for your fall reading pleasure.
http://contemporaryhaibunonline.com/ Ray Rasmussen, Technical Editor, CHO

. . .We’re happy to say that, despite Norman having been snowed in and virtually incommunicado for some weeks now, we’re still on track with Issue 1 being available for purchase if not at year’s end, then early in 2011. Purchase and pricing details will be available on our website by then too. We’ll be finalizing page design and the proofreading stages of the manuscript when Norman’s internet connection has been restored and after that, contributors/sabaki can expect to receive a pdf of their section of the content for a last look-over. The journal will run to some 150 large-size pages of renku articles and poetry and the list of contributors is roughly that number too. The listing is available for view on the DR website here:
http://www.darlingtonrichards.com/index.php/titles/journal-of-renga-renku-list-of-contributors/
Moira Richards and Norman Darlington

The new issue of Shamrock (No 16) is now online: http://shamrockhaiku.webs.com/currentissue.htm It has a big selection of Hungarian haiku in English translation, as well as an international section, an essay on haiku and copyright, as well as a haibun and a book review. It also features the winning poems from the IHS International Haiku Competition 2010. Hope you'll enjoy reading it.

Haiku Reality is Out - http://haikureality.webs.com/indexeng.htm Best wishes, Saša Važić, editor

. . .Just to let you know that "Winter Sparrows" Haigaonline volume 11 issue 2 is online
http://www.haigaonline.com/ Please join us for a wonderful collection of haiga by the following authors and artists--most are haiku-based but we do have a tanka in the issue too.

. . . Over the past six months I have thought a lot about JUXTA and have decided that it can not work -- or that I can not make it work. It would be just too much work to make it work! However you slice it, I'm withdrawing from the battle to produce a scholarly journal for the Haiku Foundation. I don't think you will be taken aback; my guess is that JUXTA is not really relevant to anybody's agenda. Scholarship has its provinces; haiku writers have theirs. Good pieces of critical and scholarly intentions are published in
various haiku journals. But above all, the discourses within the haiku reading-and-writing community while profoundly integrated into the lives of the participants are not open to the kind of debate that scholarship depends on. There are cultural reasons for this. As I said to Jim Kacian, what I do believe in now is the importance of a Loyal Opposition to the habits and models that define American haiku at present. Which is not to say that there are not exceptions to a kind of sameness; there are real artists out there; and perhaps a Loyal Opposition would, along with reservations about current discourse, feel obliged to acknowledge the works and the writers who do deserve a true literary criticism. But that's another story. I'm aware that I may be saying too much, sounding incoherent or defensive or self-deluded -- no doubt all of the above are in play at this moment -- but I felt some sense of why I'm ending my engagement is in order. Tom D¹Evelyn, Managing Editor, Single Island Press www.haikumuse.com

. . .I am writing because I have started editing a new anthology on the themes of grief, loss and change. The working title is, THE TEMPLE BELL STOPS: CONTEMPORARY POEMS OF GRIEF, LOSS AND CHANGE. Please feel free to forward my call for submissions to others who you think may be interested in contributing. I am giving preference to unpublished poems, but published poems (haiiku, senryu and tanka) should be accompanied by full credits. Best wishes, Robert worldofdewhaiku@gmail.com

. . .I’m taking part in a new project starting on January 1st and I thought you might like to join in. In an attempt to pay more attention, I will be noticing one thing properly every day (a bird eating berries, a child playing in the street) and writing it down. People from across the world will be joining me and we’ll be creating a ‘river’ of these short pieces of writing. I'll be adding mine to my blog an open field, but you don't have to take part online, you could just write them down in a notebook. If you’d like to join us find out more at http://ariverofstones.blogspot.com or email fiona@fionarobyn.com for more information. It’d also be lovely if you could forward this email to five friends you think might be interested. I have started this on my blog http://takingtankahome.blogspot.com/. And you? \o/ Jane

. . .Jim Kacian is our featured Haiku - Three Questions poet today:
http://tobaccoroadpoet.blogspot.com/2010/12/jim-kacian-three-questions.html
I also have a few updates:
http://tobaccoroadpoet.blogspot.com/2010/12/sunday-updates-december-12.html
Peace and prosperity to you all, Curtis Dunlap, tobacco road poet
http://www.tobaccoroadpoet.com; hcdunlap@gmail.com