A haiku composition stroll, or 吟行 ginko, is about opening yourself to the surroundings, quietly observing, turning over images in your mind till you get a form of words that seems well-balanced, resonant. Twenty of us came together last Sunday (July 2nd) in 中崎町 Nakazaki-cho, a small area of un-bombed, un-developed urban Osaka, largely dating to the early Showa era, up to and around the time of the Second World War, and just a stone’s throw away from Umeda Station. Houses are tiny, mainly wooden; lanes are narrow; neighbourhoods are friendly… and now feature all kinds of unusual clothes shops, cafes, alternative start-ups, and student hangouts. Haiku poets strolled around with open notebooks in between youngsters out on dates.
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This was Hailstone’s fifth purpose-made ‘Urban Ginko’ in the past fifteen years (the third to be held in Osaka, with one each in Kyoto and Kobe). In a tiny park, Tito welcomed poets and then appealed to them to ‘cut the cackle’ and try to give each other a bit of silence, in which to conceive and give birth to poems. We then fanned out, in all directions, through Nakazaki-cho, practising our art in ones and twos on a hot, breezy day. After eighty minutes or so, we converged on the second floor of Taiyo-no-To Green West Café, sited in a leafy alley close by the railway arches coming out of Central Osaka. There, we held a very enjoyable 朗読会 rodokukai, or poetry reading. A few of us went on to have a drink and a meal outside, discussing season words (Hangesho and octopus amongst them). We watched dusk begin to gather, as unceasingly the people of Osaka streamed by.
Thanks go to the organizers, including Kyoko Matsudai, whose confidence in guiding us to and from the area apparently warranted five reconnaissance missions, and Mizuho Shibuya, who was on the very first Urban Ginko we held back in 2007. Also, to Akishige Ida, who suggested the intriguing venue.
In no special order, here is a small selection of the haiku and haiqua composed that day. Which ones do you like best? Please leave a comment and tell us. We will divulge the names of poets in another month. If you were there, you may remember some of these from the café reading? [3 Aug. ’23: names of poets and no. of comments votes have now been divulged! All poets who had a haiku of theirs featured in this report should feel encouraged… and all of these subsequently had their haiku favourably mentioned in one or more comments left here. Thanks to all who bothered to comment on our poems or on the ginko report itself. We certainly got a lot this time! Much appreciated.]
Young entrepreneurs—
please guard them from hard times,
White Dragon* of the shrine [Akishige, 3 mentions]
corner sweetshop—
with time to ripen
green bananas hang [Teruko, 5]
Back alley
summer afternoon:
Kewpie dolls*
made in America [Tomiko, 2]
Neighbourhood rights—
the gaffer hangs his laundry
above the cat massage caff* [Tito, 2]
A doorway just
forty centimetres wide:
July breeze
lifts its fairy noren* [Tito, 11]
Backstreet art academy
… and I meet a flying whale!* [Jeanne, 2]
Between buildings
falling from the sky,
a lush vine-covered wall [Jeanne, 2]
retro coffee shop—
on the amber glass of water
summer’s slanting rays [Mizuho, 4]
sweltering afternoon—
the couple stoop to eye
the streetside menu [Akihiko, 2]
yawning pose
of a mannequin in hoodie—
languid summer sky [Akihiko, 4]
Che Guevara
on the faded wall:
at what is he still
sternly gazing? [Ayako, 3]
Three red arrows lead
to the ‘White Dragon Shrine’*—
green summer shadow [Ayako, 1]
quaint old homes
far from urban din—
buttercup-lined alley [Mayumi K, 3]
“retro” street …
she might turn up any time,
my high school love [Akira, 6]
two foreign friends
shimmer on ahead—
melting power cables [Anna, 1]
busy sweet potato café*:
pressed against
the upstairs window
a grandma’s face [Margarite, 6]
on side streets
in this small town
teenagers in full bloom [Duro, 3]
.
* Notes:
White Dragon Shrine – Hakuryu-okami, a tiny Shinto shrine, found at the end of an alley, whose serpentine deity is thought to give blessings galore;
kewpie dolls – infant Cupids, popularized in Japan by having been used as the icon of the most famous mayonnaise brand;
cat massage caff – a café in which customers can stroke cats kept there for the purpose;
noren – stylish cut curtain lintel dressings made of cloth;
flying whale – this reduced-size model of a whale was spied suspended under an open roof;
sweet potato café – specializing in confectioneries made of satsumaimo.
Icebox 