I am a haiku lover – though I don”t write them well at all. The form is so deceptively simple – syllabic count and all – and so marvelously complex that entire libraries have been written just analyzing the form and how to write it well. Over the years, I”ve been blessed with sharing listserv email writing lists with two wonderful haikuists who have a gift for shaping 17 syllables (or three lines) into art that is as delicate and concrete as origami sculptures. Paul Mena is one of these – I”ll save the other for another post, because she deserves her own – but you can get a taste of her work here – just follow the “next” links all the way to the end.

Paul Mena is a self-acknowledged city boy – a fact that he openly admits makes his “nature poetry” a little more urban-focused than most traditional haiku. I “met” Paul through internet listservs and mailing groups in the early 1990s, and found myself delighted by his daily haiku posted to the lists. He had a gift for capturing those perfect snapshot moments and breathing life into them. Witness:

clinging
to her sundress
the wind

my favorite perfume
the wind
in her hair

outdoor concert:
a lonely pigeon
answers the oboe

In an interview with Simply Haiku, Paul said this about what inspired him to write haiku:

I picked up a copy of Cor van den Heuvel”s “Haiku Anthology” in 1991 in a book store and read about halfway through it before I realized that the proprietors were trying to close for the evening. I had been writing poetry for years, but the brevity and poignancy of haiku – the ability to say so much with so little – spoke to me in a profound way. I was hooked.

Paul blogs almost daily at Extra Special Bitter and haikupoet. The two are nearly identical – with the exception of the lists of links and related blogs.