21-SEIKI HAIKU NO JIKUU / THE HAIKU UNIVERSE FOR THE 21ST CENTURY: Japanese Haiku 2008, edited by Modern Haiku Association. Nagata-shobo, 2008, 216 pp., ¥2,500 (paper)
The American poet Patricia Donegan (b. 1945) is quite well known in haiku circles, both for her own poems, and for her writings about haiku. Besides her own collections, she has issued one guide on creating haiku for children (or even interested adults). She has also studied meditation in the context of Tibetan Buddhism, which colors much of her thought in the present volume.
"Haiku Mind," consequently, sees itself as much more than a guide to the brief poetic form originating in Japan, and taken up widely overseas. In presenting 108 short verses, the author seeks to explore haiku as a spiritual path, a "profound way of seeing our everyday world" and of "living our lives with the awareness of the moment expressed in haiku." This is in keeping with the remit of the publisher, which issues a number of such consolatory guides and is sympathetic to Eastern thought.