February 2017 Meeting

Post date: Feb 26, 2017 2:13:56 AM

The February 2017 Haiku Northwest meeting took place on Thursday, February 23 at 7:00 pm in the Stadler Room at the Lake Forest Park Town Center at Third Place Commons. The meeting was called to order by our new president, Michelle Schaeffer, with six others in attendance: Ida Freilinger, Connie Hutchison, Ron LaMarsh, Tanya McDonald, Angie Terry, and Michael Dylan Welch. Since Ron was a new member, attending for the first time, we made introductions.

Angie Terry announced that the Pacific Northwest region of the Haiku Society of America will hold its annual meeting on Saturday, June 3, with a morning haiku walk at Seattle’s Discovery Park, time to visit the visitor center and have a picnic followed by an afternoon of readings and workshops at the Magnolia Public Library. More information will follow closer to the date. Michael Dylan Welch talked about the upcoming workshop he will be giving, “To Say the Least,” on short poetry forms (February 27 at the Kirkland Library), and his four “Poets Wanted: Dead or Alive” presentations, starting with Issa (February 28 at the Redmond Library), and readings he and Tanya McDonald will be doing of their book Seven Suns, Seven Moons (March 6 in Auburn and March 15 in Woodinville). Michelle provided members with a cheat sheet of upcoming submission deadlines for journals and contests.

Michelle then led a discussion of Martin Lucas’s essay, “Haiku as Poetic Spell.” We read the various haiku he used as examples to illustrate his premise that “what is described is somehow so satisfying that we linger in the moment, and almost seek to dwell in it.” Each of us had differing reactions both to the haiku presented and to the idea of “poetic spell,” especially as it was set up on an either/or dichotomy of process and goals. It made for a lively and thought-provoking discussion, and was a good lead in to our discussion of the haiku members had brought to share, which occupied the second hour of our meeting.

—Angela Terry