2023 Events
Celebrating our 35th anniversary in 2023
Haiku Northwest invites you to attend any of our free monthly and quarterly meetings, which usually focus on rounds of sharing and workshopping our haiku, with occasional presentations and writing exercises. The first few meetings 2023 will be on Zoom (join our mailing list to receive each Zoom link), but we are exploring when and how to resume in-person meetings. Listed here are all our meetings, a few special events, plus significant regional or national events. If you’re giving a haiku workshop or know of another haiku event in the area, please let us know so we can add it. Monthly meetings usually start at 6:30 p.m. with informal socializing, with a more formal start at 7:00 p.m., and occur on the second Thursday of each month, except as indicated. For 2023 we will also have quarterly meetings on selected Saturdays in place of that month’s Thursday meeting, for three hours usually starting at 1:00 p.m. All dates and details are subject to change, and will be confirmed via the Haiku Northwest Mailchimp mailing list (through which you may be provided additional details, such as Zoom links—if you have questions, please email haikunw1988@gmail.com). To suggest regional haiku-related events to add to the following schedule, please contact Michael Dylan Welch at WelchM@aol.com. We’ll update content as soon as we confirm the details. See you at our next event!
In addition to the following events, the Washington region of the Haiku Society of America plans to have an annual regional meeting on a summer date to be announced, and may have additional events. For more information, please contact the HSA regional coordinator for 2023, Richard Tice. Haiku Northwest is independent of the HSA Washington state region.
2023 Meetings
All online via Zoom, unless specified otherwise, and all times Pacific Time. Events in green and indented are not Haiku Northwest events, but may be of interest to our members. For more details about events not run by Haiku Northwest, please click the links provided.
January 12
Monthly Meeting, 7:00 to 9:00 p.m. on Zoom
Discussing haiku themed on the topic of social justice, plus an anonymous haiku workshop.
February
National Haiku Writing Month
Visit the NaHaiWriMo website and Facebook page
Write at least one haiku per day for each day of February
February 11 (Saturday)
Quarterly Meeting, 1:00 to 4:00 p.m. on Zoom
Humor in haiku, with an introduction by Michael Dylan Welch, and featured reader Aaron Barry, followed by a NaHaiWriMo writing prompt and an anonymous haiku workshop.
March 1–31
Enter the fourth annual Mukai Garden Haiku Festival. Results announced April 9, with winners on display around the garden throughout April. Visit the garden at 18017 107th Ave SW, Vashon Island, Washington.
March 9
Monthly Meeting, 7:00 to 9:00 p.m. on Zoom
April 7–9
Washington State Convention Center (including a “Haiku Targets” presentation by Michael Dylan Welch at 10:30 a.m. on April 9)
April 13
Monthly Meeting, 7:00 to 9:00 p.m. on Zoom
April 14–16
Seattle Cherry Blossom and Japanese Cultural Festival
Seattle Center, Seattle, Washington (in person)
April 15–16
VanDusen Botanical Garden, Vancouver, British Columbia
April 17 (Monday)
International Haiku Poetry Day
May 13 (Saturday)
Quarterly Meeting, 1:00 to 4:00 p.m. on Zoom
Featuring Geneviève Wynand and Agnes Eva Savich as guest readers, plus Jonathan Van Harmelen with a presentation on “The Life of Kenneth Yasuda: Kibei Poet, Haiku Translator, and Literary Critic.” We will also have a round of haiku critique if you have haiku to share. Jonathan’s talk presents a new view on the legacy of haiku poet and translator Kenneth Yasuda. A kibei poet originally from rural California, and a graduate of the University of Washington, Yasuda emerged as one of the most prominent Japanese American academics, fashioning himself as a translator of classical haiku, tanka, and waka poetry. During his wartime incarceration in several incarceration camps, Yasuda transformed from a writer of Victorian-style poetry to a haiku expert, and later befriended the famed Southern poet John Gould Fletcher. This talk will conclude with a discussion of his postwar writings, culminating in the publication of his 1957 book The Japanese Haiku and his review of John Okada’s No-No Boy.
Jonathan van Harmelen is a Ph.D. candidate in history at UC Santa Cruz. A specialist in U.S. social and political history, he is writing his dissertation on Congress and the wartime incarceration of Japanese Americans. In addition to his dissertation, he frequently writes about new topics in Japanese American history, and he has been featured in the Chicago Tribune, LA Times, and Seattle Times. He is currently working on a biography of poet and translator Kenneth Yasuda and his legacy in Western haiku studies and Asian American literature.
1:00 Welcome by Michael Dylan Welch / read-around
1:15 Breakout rooms
1:35 Featured readers: Geneviève Wynand and Agnes Eva Savich
1:55 Break
2:00 Jonathan Van Harmelen: “The Life of Kenneth Yasuda: Kibei Poet, Haiku Translator, and Literary Critic” (plus Q&A)
3:00 Break
3:05 Haiku sharing/discussion
4:00 Optional socializing
June 8
Monthly Meeting, 7:00 to 9:00 p.m.
June 9–10
Mini-Conference for the Haiku Society of America Oregon Region
Newport Art Center / Sylvia Beach Hotel, Newport, Oregon
[for details, email Shelley Baker-Gard at sbakergard@msn.com]
June 28–July 2
Cincinnati, Ohio
July 3
Tanka Day
Cincinnati, Ohio
July 8–9
Meydenbauer Center, 11100 NE 6th Street in Bellevue, Washington
(look for more information about their annual haiku contest also)
July 13
Monthly Meeting, 7:00 to 9:00 p.m.
Haiku Northwest meeting at the Lake Forest Park Library, September 27, 2018. Left to right are Cara Izumi, Millie Renfrow, Ron Swanson, Curtis Manley, Arlene Springer, Philaah Jones, Terran Campbell, Tanya McDonald, Dianne Garcia, Gary Evans, and Angie Terry. Photo by Michael Dylan Welch. Please join us!
Haiku Northwest meeting at the Bellevue Regional Library, August 7, 2008. Left to right are Curtis Manley, Helen Russell, William Scott Galasso, Ida Freilinger, Bryson Nitta, Tanya McDonald, Connie Hutchison, Dejah Leger, Susan Miller, Terran Campbell, Joshua Beach, Angela Terry, Marilyn Sandall, and Herb McClees. Photo by Michael Dylan Welch. Please join us!
August 12 (Saturday, in person)
Quarterly Meeting, 2:00 to 5:00 p.m. Lake Hills Greenbelt Garden Shelter, 15500 SE 16th Street, Bellevue, Washington (see map shown here). Please bring snacks (optional) and a notebook and writing tool for our haiku walk (during which we’ll write haiku to share later). Bring books to give and take on a “free table.” We’ll also make haiku weathergrams to take home and hang in your neighborhood as a way to share haiku.
August 31
Porad Haiku Award Deadline
(received by this date)
See 2023 winners
Winners announced at the Seabeck Haiku Getaway on October 28, 2023; the Porad Award celebrates its 20th anniversary in 2023!
September 1 and 2
Moon Viewing Festival, with haiku contest each night, 7:00 p.m.
September 14
Monthly Meeting, 7:00 to 9:00 p.m. Zoom meeting. Haiku Northwest was founded on September 15, 1988, and at this meeting we’ll start to celebrate our 35th anniversary with Connie Hutchison’s presentation, “A Reflection of Francine Porad: Visual Artist, Haiku Writer, Founder of Haiku Northwest, and Editor of Brussels Sprout.” Watch for more details.
September 15
Today marks the 35th anniversary of Haiku Northwest’s first meeting in 1988 in Bellevue, Washington.
September 25–30
Sponsored by Bellevue College, Bellevue, Washington (public events on September 30)
October 12
Monthly Meeting, 7:00 to 9:00 p.m. Zoom meeting.
October 26–29
Seabeck Haiku Getaway (our fifteenth annual retreat)
In-person gathering, with a weekend theme of “Gifts of Nature,” welcoming naturalist Jeff Hoagland as our featured guest.
November 4, 2023
Haiku Northwest is staffing a haiku table at Bunka no Hi, sponsored by the Japanese Cultural & Community Center of Washington at 1414 S Weller Street in Seattle. 11:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Free.
November 11 (Saturday, in person)
Quarterly Meeting, 10:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. at Folio Seattle, a membership library and cultural center at Pike Place Market in Seattle (give yourself a bit of extra time to find the location at 93 Pike Street, #307, Seattle, WA 98101). Free to attend, but please RSVP by email Caroline Cumming at caroline@folioseattle.org.
10:30 a.m. — Welcome, announcements, and a round of haiku reading (on autumn or thankfulness themes)
11:00 a.m. — Featured presentation
Michael Dylan Welch: "Our Endless and Proper Work: Learning Attention from Mary Oliver"
Mary Oliver has been called the poet of attention—especially an attention to nature. Join us on a deep-dive exploration of how her poetry demonstrates and validates close attention for poets of any kind, especially haiku poets, and how our attention to experience and emotion can help us live our wild and precious lives.
12:30 p.m. — Break
12:45 p.m. — Responsive writing (share if you wish)
1:30 p.m. — End
December 14
Monthly Meeting, 7:00 to 9:00 p.m.
Watch for more details soon on our 2024 meetings!
Please also check the schedule for the Seattle Japanese Garden (see this website also). Several of the garden’s events typically include a haiku component, such as the moonviewing festival, which usually includes a haiku contest.
Click also to see event listings for 2022, 2021, 2020, 2019, 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015, 2014, 2013, 2012, 2011, 2010, and 2009.