When I opened the little book “Breathmarks: haiku to read in the dark” by Gary Hotham published by Canon Press, I was immediately drawn by the table of contents which was a simple list of the haiku’s “first line” with the corresponding page number. (Readers can browse the table of contents and some pages of the book on Amazon)
These “first lines”, alternating between short and long and short, could be read like a series of haiku. These ready-made haiku were sometimes funny, sometimes moving, and simply beautiful.
Example:
soft rain 72
I lean 73
at the bus stop 74
Source: table of contents of “Breathmarks” by Gary Hotham (photo)
This is a haiku made from the three “first lines” of haiku of pages 72, 73 and 74 written by Gary.
Here are more Ready-made haiku taken from the table of contents of “Breathmarks: Haiku to read in the dark”
by Gary Hotham (Canon Press, 1999, Isbn 1-885767-58-7):
coffee 20
night comes 21
more darkness 22
picking up the shells 26
the heat 27
music two centuries old 44
rest stop 45
the wind 46
spring wind 48
distand thunder 49
more coffee made 50
on my birthday 64
up late 65
the library book 66
no place 67
no hurry in the wind 68
outside the door 69
sipping the soup 80
this summer night 81
the sound they make 82
shadow 94
early in the night 95
before the dew is off 96
she comes back 91
one mirror for everyone 92
time to go 93
The table of contents and its “First lines” are only a sense of the beautiful haiku to come. Gary Hotham’s writing is simply wonderfl. Here are the three complete haiku from page 84, 85, 86:
waiting up-
one hand warms
the other
a pile of orange peelings –
the night watchman
away from his desk
around our feet –
water on its way
to more water
Gary Hotham in Breathmarks
And, if you take the first line of each haiku, you get this beautiful and new “ready-made haiku”:
waiting up 84
a pile of orange peelings 85
around our feet 86
(Table of contents of Breathmarks by Gary Hotham)
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