A Recycler's Green Dream: A Gently Ironic Ecological Senryu Poem

I go through my things:

Reduce, reuse, recycle.

All gone! Nothing left!

Senryū (川柳) is a Japanese word. It may be translated into English as "river willow." The word serves as a personal name and as a poetic term.

As a name, senryū is that of a famous Japanese writer, Karai Hachiemon (September 23, 1719-October 30, 1790). Karai lived during the Edo period (江戸時代, Edo jidai) in Japanese history. The period also may be described as the Tokugawa period (徳川時代, Tokugawa jidai) in honor of the prominent clan that militarily controlled Japan from March 24, 1603 until May 3, 1868.

Karai was the beloved editor of anthologies which were published every year from 1757 until his death. He also was the main poetic contributor to many of his publications. In fact, he wrote 80,000 of the nearly 2-1/2 million poems which he collected and published over the course of 33 years.

Karai assumed the name Senryū for his poetry writing and publishing. It became inextricably linked with his individualized interests in poetry. In fact, it ultimately replaced his birth name as that by which the world knows him. Many therefore will recognize the name Karai Senryū (柄井川柳) before they will Karai Hachiemon.

Haifūyanagidaru (誹風柳多留) can be considered as one of Senryū's most famous works. It contained a distinct poetic form. The poetic form had an immediately recognizable format. For example, it required a total of no more and no less than three lines.

Senryū's signature poetry carried a maximum syllable count. No more than seventeen syllables -- and in fact no less than three -- had to be spread over three lines. But the actual line by line division of syllables reflected the decision-making of the poem's creator.

The length of the senryū in fact totaled however little or however much it took to say what needed to be said. For example, one of Senryū's poems was about a robber and numbered just nine syllables. Three syllables therefore were apportioned to each of the three poetic lines.

Many modern poets nevertheless adhere to a set division of syllables for each line of senryū. They oftentimes give a parallel structure to the first and third lines of the poems. They therefore tend to follow a line count of five syllables in the first and last lines and of seven in the middle. As a result, their finished product will look as follows:

• First line: 5 syllables

• Second line: 7 syllables

• Third line: 5 syllables

Senryū's signature poetry also carried a set thematic format. For example, it could be humorous. But the humor tended to be cynical, of a darkly ironic humor.

The irony in Senryū's poetry dealt with human foibles and frailties. Human weaknesses were depicted as general observations of failings. They were not intended to be caustic, personalized, searing attacks or indictments against specifically recognizable individuals.

Finally, the senryū by Senryū lacked a set metrical structure or rhyme scheme. It in fact was not intended to be copied or recognized by any tailorized metrical pattern or rhyme scheme. Instead, the senryū was supposed to be recognizable by the following traits:

• Absence of meter and rhythm
• In the cynical or ironic presentation of human interest stories
• Over three lines totaling a maximum of seventeen syllables and a minimum of three.

The term trash can be used to identify anything that is not what its owner or user needs or seeks it to be. It therefore has a status equivalent to that of a weed. It undoubtedly has a forgotten or unknown decorative or practical use. It nevertheless lacks recognition of that functional or ornamental status in the place and time slots which it fills with the owner or user in question.

But according to the saying, one person's trash is another person's treasure and vice versa. The saying may be applied to account for some of the expected and unexpected surprises to be found in dump trucks, garbage cans, and landfills. At the same time, it ironically may be used to explain the efficacious circulating of objects from one owner or user to the next.

Landfills are not a phenomenon of the 20th century. For example, they may date back to the first shell dropped at the entrance by the first cave-dwelling human. Or they may track back to the first banana peel dropped to the forest floor by the first human high rise tree dweller. Either way, a habit was formed regarding a location for the immediately unusable portions of an object otherwise meeting immediate human needs. The accumulation of smells and stains for the discarded objects was instrumental in turning that first accidental dump location into the first of the world's landfills and refuse collection sites.

The two examples cited above ironically can be equally illustrative of the environmentally friendly motto of "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle." The first word, reduce, encourages us to choose items which are necessary and less likely to be trashed. The second word, reuse, exhorts us to select items in many ways and on many occasions. The third word, recycle, inspires us to use items which can meet other needs, for us or for others.

In the way of an example of the immediately preceding information, the banana peel is not edibly attractive to humans. After lying on the forest floor, it may be covered with such ground dwelling and foraging insects as ants. It still may serve a human need if it is not dragged away and put to another use by those who forage the same space as the original human tree dweller. Specifically, it produces dark brown, fresh smelling, nutrient rich, organic soil with its natural composting -- or decomposition -- in adequate heat, light and moisture.

The nut shell also can serve to illustrate "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle." It has uses other than its life mission of protecting the seed which it encloses. For example, it may be ground up into sawdust. It therefore may be used as a drainage medium for plants, a glycerin-based hand soap, an ornament strung with dried berries, a pest barrier against slugs, and a special potpourri with clean, dry cones, petals, pods, seeds and spices.

The practice of "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle" can be analyzed in many positive ways. For example, the implementation of such wise use and reuse of resources discourages blockages or shortages in the world's economies. It encourages ecological flow with its emphasis on situating resource decision-making within the wider context of the after and side effects of multiple versus unique uses of resources. It therefore leaves the chain of initial use and continued and innovative reuse ecologically unbroken, environmentally unharmed and universally dynamic.

My special thanks to:

• Talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the Internet;
• Those who educate about and practice the green motto of "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle." as individuals and as organizations;
• Those who preserved and popularized the senryū such that older literature can be appreciated and adapted to modern needs, sensitivities and uses in ways that respect what goes before and encourages what comes next;
• Virginia State University and Polytechnic Institute for the high caliber of its Carol M. Newman Library collection of books on recycling and resource use and on poetry and the analysis and criticism of poetry.

Brechbühl, Beat. Die Nacht voll Martinshürner: Haiku und Senryu. Pforzheim: Hertenstein-Presse, c1984.

Buerschaper, Margret. Das deutsche Kurzgedicht in der Tradition japanischer Gedichtformen: Haiku, Senryū, Tanka, Renga: geschichtliche und gattungstheoretische Darstellung. Göttingen: Im Graphikum Dr. Mock, 1987.

Howard, Mason. “Uses for Nut Shells.” eHow Hobbies & Sciences. Demand Media, Inc., 1999-2011. www.ehow.com/about_5414989_uses-nut-shells.html (Last accessed December 18, 2011)

Silverstein, Shel. The giving tree. New York: Harper & Row, 1964.

Taback, Simms. Joseph Had a Little Overcoat. New York: Viking Juvenile, 1999.

Ueda, Makoto (Comp.). Light verse from the floating world: an anthology of premodern Japanese senryu. New York: Columbia University Press, c1999.

Copyright Sunday, December 18, 2012 by Derdriu