Haiku is:

1. Intuitive response to the Natural world.

2. Expanded awareness of our One-ness with Nature.

3. Simplicity without strivings or antagonisms.

4. An expansion from the specific to the general, or, a contraction from the general to the specific.

5. Sees us in our endless becomings. In Nature, nothing is static. Samsara.

6. A moment of increased awareness. Intuitive in regard to our Oneness-in-Nature.

7. Simplicity -- simply stated.

8. Takes all things religiously (not denominationally). Not religiously philosophical.

9. Avoids grimness, violence - being essentially life enhancing.

10. Refinement of language, avoids the vulgar and the shocking (for the sake of shocking).

11. A nudge of enlightenment.

12. Intuition.

13. Poetry of the enlightened spirit.

14. Deals with the Naturalness of Man.

15. Eternity in a moment.

16. Deals with Nature's purity As NATURE.

17. Sincerity in all things. Helps us to transcend through our alikeness with ALL Nature.

18. Can contain implications of humor, contradictions and paradoxes.

19. Shows us "ideally" our One-ness with ALL.

20. The whole Truth, honed to purity. A flash of insight unresolved by intellectual comment. NATURAL.


(DRAGONFLY: A QUARTERLY OF HAIKU - July `76, Vol. 4, no. 3)