"Haiku," edited by haiku practitioner David Cobb, and "Haiku Love," edited by Japanese language scholar Alan Cummings, are both fun books. Originally published by the British Museum, they are sumptuously illustrated with nihonga (Japanese-style painting) and ukiyo-e (woodblock prints) from the museum's collections, each haiku presented with the original given in an elegant Japanese calligraphic font. The format makes both publications look like picture books with captions in verse.

Haiku. Edited by David Cobb, THE OVERLOOK PRESSHaiku Love. Edited by Alan Cummings, THE OVERLOOK PRESSHaiku in English: The First Hundred Years. Edited by Jim Kacian, Philip Rowland, and Allan Burns, W. W. NORTON

Take these two pieces in "Haiku":