informal talk about forms: the renga and the renku

by Tom Adam

Most formal poetry has rules about how words are arranged on the page. Sometimes they’re based on sound patterns, sometimes on stress patterns, sometimes on counting letters or syllables. These rules are often based on a way of arranging the content of poem, allowing the form to emphasize an idea or a style. While they can be worked against — often in creative and pleasurable ways — it is usually a good idea to follow them.

an easel
in the herb garden –
scent of sage.

As a form, the Japanese renga has rules for both structure and content, including a series of rules about how topics and themes could be addressed. Wikipedia has an excellent page with many of the traditional rules for renga, so I won’t go over the whole of them. Originally, the renga was a collaborative form with different poets adding verses in a linked form. Each added verse related to the one immediately preceding it, but, other than the rules regarding themes, did not have to continue with any other verses. Ultimately, each two-verse section could be considered its own poem within the larger context of the renga. These linked stanzas represented a conversation among the poets and ranged across a variety of topics.

welcome party –
three rabbits lined up
by the station

Structurally, the renga became somewhat standardized on stanzas alternating between a 17-sound stanza and a 14-sound stanza (the “linking” stanza). The 17-sound stanza was grouped into a 5-7-5 structure, the 14-sound stanza into a 7-7 structure. Commonly, English renga are written based on syllable count. Rhyme is not a traditionally incorporated element.

golf course –
lost pet rabbits
run wild.

The first stanza has an especially important place in renga. Known as the hokku, it has to include a season word and a kireji, or cutting word. The season-word generally comes from a traditional list (I find this one pretty good) that refers to the time of year the renga was written. The kireji (from wikipedia):

Kireji have no direct equivalent in English. Mid-verse kireji have been described as sounded rather than written punctuation. In English-language haiku and hokku, as well as in translations of such verses into this language, kireji may be represented by punctuation (typically by a dash or an ellipsis), an exclamatory particle (such as ‘how … ‘), or simply left unmarked.

The kireji in Japanese is a word or conjugation that marks a shift, of sorts, in the poem. In Basho’s well-known haiku masterpiece, the first phrase “old pond” (furuike ya), is set off from the second two lines and marked by the kireji “ya” which is not translated but the shift is felt in the poem, which might be marked by a colon if written in punctuated English.

tall damp grass –
rabbits leap from rock to rock
on the hillside

Renku is a derivative style of the renga. It relaxes many of the rules that are considered necessary in a traditional renga (what words may be included, what references and allusions are permissible and some of the thematic elements it contains). You can call the renku (also called haikai no renga) a pop-culture version of the renga. It maintains the overall form and variable length of the renga, but it allows much greater creative freedom. In fact, most contemporary renga is actually renku. William Higginson has a great, though not recently updated, page about the renku at Renku Home.

dandelions
brighten roadside verges –
missing my rabbit

Although it is more relaxed, the hokku stanza and the concept of the kireji are stylistic elements still commonly maintained. Renku also keeps the concept of the poem as a conversation, even as it has moved from the reaches of high society to everyday life, and only later developed into solo-author sequences, and ultimately, into the modern haiku.

hot pavements –
littered with
tired bees.

Below are some additional links to get you started in your exploration of traditional Japanese forms.

Aha poetry, by Jane Reichhold. On this site you can read a collaborative renga with author notes to see what was going through their minds as the poets responded to each other.

• “Omelette,” A traditional spring Kasen renga by Sue Stanford and Jane Reichhold.
• “Sea Shells in White,” by Francine Porad and Arthur Ramos.

Renga is a site written by various authors from the UK. They have an events page highlighting various renga days throughout the year. Below are two renga from written collaboratively by several participants.

• “Cup of Light”
• Spitting Pips“

Poets.org offers a short overview of the renga and how teachers are now using the form to teach students how to write poetry and to work collaboratively.

Many of the poets in the Read Write Poem community are experienced in writing haiku, renga, and other Japanese forms. Others might try this type of verse for the first time after reading about it.

In the spirit of the Japanese tradition of collaborative renga, we’d like to start a renku chain here, in the comments section. After you read the first three-line hokku (for our purposes, think of it as a haiku) beginning the series, add your own two-line renku as a response, then the next person will follow with another two-line renku and so on, until the 17th writer ends with a three-line hokku (we get to set our own patterns). We’ll continue the poem until we reach 36 lines, the traditional Japanese length of a Kasen renga.

Read Write Poem contributer Juliet Wilson is the author of the haiku you see interspersed throughout this article. You can read more of her haiku and nature-inspired poems on her blog, Crafty Green Poet.