Eh, Kerouac as a poet. . . If you are interested in haiku, or in the ways Eastern poetic forms and sensibilities have been imported to the west, if I were you, I would read Gary Snyder, who helped import haiku to the beats and that generation in this country. Snyder is a serious poet and serious Buddhist, who inspired Kerouac and other beats, but none of them did work to match what Snyder did. Book of Haikus compiler and introducer Weinrich makes a case for this book as both serious poetry and irreverent (Kerouac called his American haiku "pops"), but I'm not convinced. There are some decent haiku in this large collection, collected attractively in a small book format, and if you are a Kerouac completist, (as I kinda am) you will want to own this, but for most readers interested in Kerouac and/or haiku, I would just read Kerouac's fiction.

veľa počasia

sweet ones. kerouac is a man of talent. even though these are not traditional haikus, they are a piece of great poetry, capturing lovely moments in everyday lives. when you see a steam coming out of your freshly brewed coffee, and you notice it, you aprreciate it - those kind of moments.

Dharma rascals

'One day I will find the right words, and they will be simple'
Jack Kerouac
The Dharma Bums (1958)

In my careful first steps on the Zen path, I am not very picky, with every teacher and in every zendo or monastery I pick something up, a picture a word a sentence. Sometimes just like when I hear a politician speaking, ... on the one hand on the other hand ... there is something in there ... and the next politician I think the same. At the Longquan Temple in Utrecht, the meditation was recently led by Chan master Ton Lathouwers. He effortlessly connected the highest Chan or Zen ideals with his own daily struggle. Actually, this was the first time that a teacher really touched me. The conversation afterwards was also personal and heart to heart. When something is to be transferred, perhaps the only way, directly between master and student and in the silence of our meditation.

The accumulating misunderstandings between Eastern words and Western ears are innumerable.
Let me start with Jack Kerouac, the father of the beatniks, who discovered Buddhism in the early fifties. Among others via the book Walden by Henry Thoreau. Kerouac learned to meditate and wrote two books about Buddhism, which his publishers were not interested in. Kerouac would later join a group of poets, students and philosophers who studied the source texts, something that Kerouac himself could not. One of them would become the protagonist (Japhy) of his second novel The Dharma Bums. In the novel Japhy gets a vision of young people who wander around the world aimlessly, to find themselves or to live as a 'Zen Lunatic'. A prophetic vision.

The established science did not get much on with Kerouac's Buddhism, but for many fresh young baby boomers it was a first acquaintance. Ginsberg started meditating through Kerouac. Bob Dylan gets interested through Ginsberg. Through Dylan, oriental thoughts came to The Beatles. Who had previously changed their name from Beetles to the Beatles as an ode to Kerouac. Through "Within you without you" the Eastern wisdom flowed into my teenage attic room. 'And to see you're really only very small and life flows on within you and without you'

'Within you without you' is the only number on Sgt. Pepper written by George Harrison. He composed the piece after he studied and meditated in India for six weeks in 1966 with his mentor, Ravi Shankar. It contains many ideas from Hindu philosophy and teachings of the Vedas encapsulated in the exploration of spiritual themes that had become popular in the Summer of Love. Musically it relies heavily on the often much longer compositions by Ravi Shankar himself.

Fifty years later I continue my wanderings, sometimes in zendo's and monasteries, more often through poetry or art, always in the silence of my meditation.

Me, my pipe,
my folded legs -
Far from Buddha

Jack Kerouac
Dharma Pops (1956)

I liked these haikus —
And how Jack fit big ideas —
Into little lines.

Allora partiamo col presupposto che non mi aspettavo tanto da questo libro, e da una parte mi sbagliavo. Inizialmente mi sembrava moooolto noioso, non capivo il senso di queste "poesie senza rima" e mi scocciavo un po' a leggerlo, però l'ho voluto continuare. Le ultime 100 pagine penso siano le migliori, dal momento in cui l'autore inizia ad essere sempre più attaccato all'alcool i suoi haiku sono molto più divertenti e a parer mio prendono di più. L'introduzione dell'ultimo capitolo ha totalmente ragione, cioè che nell'ultimo capitolo sembra che l'autore non sia più lui a parlare ma bensì il suo gatto. Fa tantiiii riferimenti al gatto, a ciò che é la vita di tutti giorni, e anche ciò che é lo star male, ho apprezzato particolarmente l'ultimo contesto. É molto bello come lui faccia vedere sia i momenti felici che quelli tristi della sua vita, o comunque di parti di essa. Consiglio questo libro, ma lo consiglio di leggere a un'età "piccola" (io ho 14 anni) e poi a un'età più adulta, perché secondo me si può comprendere in un modo diverso e magari migliore.
Infine ho dato solo 3 stelle perché le prime 70 pagine non mi hanno preso tanto, e all'inizio in alcuni momenti forse é un po' noioso, se potessi darei 3.75 stelle ma qui non si può.

This collection of haiku is interesting because it was written by Kerouac. While reading through them the first time I thought that, by today's standards, many of the verses lacked the juxtaposition and leap that the best haiku contain. And yet, paging through them again, I got a sense of Kerouac and his surroundings, tidbits of what he noticed from Whalen's cabin in Berkeley and the apartment he shared with his mother in Orlando. Kerouac aficionados will find this worth reading.

Here are two I like:

In enormous blizzard
burying everything
My cat's out mating

Debris on the lake
--my soul
Is upset

The other man, just as / lonesome as I am / In this empty universe

Maybe not even real haikus, but real short words, like a breeze instead of longwinded overdone poetry. The haikus from his cat's perspective while he was drunk (getting a self-portrait done) are so lighthearted. Pictures of his real sketches were a nice addition.

There is no deep-
Turning-about
In the Void

Wonderful!

In the past few years, I have grown increasingly enamored with short poetry and the art of the haiku. Jack Kerouac's Book of Haikus is an enjoyable and inspirational read to which I will often return in days to come.

Gary Snyder actually brought haiku to the West Coast poets, having spent the early 50's traveling in Japan and practicing Zen Buddhism. Kerouac studied the works of Basho, Buson, Shiki and Issa - among others - and pioneered the American haiku movement. He also turned to Buddhist study and practice after his "on the road" period from 1953-1956, and I think his writing haiku complemented his spiritual practice.

This collection of poems, edited by Regina Weinreich, includes examples of Kerouac's entire range of haiku, to include "Book of Haikus" (which Kerouac supposedly organized for publication), "Dharma Pops" (haiku in action and as they appear in several of his books) and haiku from his notebooks from 1956 thru 1966. Following are only a few of my favorites:

From "Book of Haikus":

The tree looks
like a dog
Barking at heaven


Frozen
in the birdbath,
A leaf


November the seventh
The last
Faint cricket


In my medicine cabinet
the winter fly
Has died of old age


From "Dharma Pops"

In the sun
the butterfly wings
Like a church window


Swinging on delicate hinges
the Autumn leaf
Almost off the stem


Haiku, schmaiku, I can't
understand the intention
Of reality


Grass waves,
hens chuckle,
Nothing's happening


From the Notebooks:

Debris on the lake
--my soul
Is upset


Wednesday blah
blah, blah -
My mind hurts


September raindrops
from my roof -
Soon icicles

"Hitch hiked a thousand
miles and brought
You wine"
+
"Holding up my
purring cat to the moon
I sighed"
= my new definition of Kerouac.

A remarkable and thought-provoking collection.

"You'd be surprised
how little I knew
Even up to yesterday"

"Take a cup of water
from the ocean
And there I am"