HAIKU results – NZPS International Poetry Competition 2025

HAIKU JUDGE’S REPORT – SCOTT MASON

Haiku poet and commentator William J. Higginson observed in his classic The Haiku Handbook (Kodansha International, 1985) that “[t]he central act of haiku is letting an object or event touch us, and then sharing it with another.” As judge for the adult division of this year’s NZPS haiku competition, I consider myself privileged to have been invited to share in an extraordinary range of such personal experiences from more than one hundred submitting poets.

In keeping with Bill Higginson’s observation, my principal judging criterion was simply this: Did I feel somehow touched or even moved by the experience conveyed in and by the haiku I just read?

Allow me to amplify.

For starters, it’s worth noting that a reader can be touched or moved at any number of points along the emotional spectrum, such as those of empathy, delight, loneliness or optimism. I believe these sorts of feelings are the primary and most enduring kinds of responses that the best (i.e., most memorable) haiku elicit from engaged readers. We experience poetry, as we experience life itself, first and foremost with the heart. A poem’s particular form and technical features can be vitally important, but only insofar as they contribute to its overall emotional effect.

That said, a haiku with obvious emotive content might not necessarily translate into a haiku with a genuine emotional effect. To accomplish that, the poem must also feel natural and authentic rather than in any way constructed or contrived, the latter inviting a reader to reject its sentiment as “unearned.” Of course, these are personal responses and, therefore, subjective calls. A different judge—even one using the criterion of emotional effect—almost certainly would have produced a different set of selections.

Before proceeding to mine, I wish to express my appreciation to the New Zealand Poetry Society for entrusting me with this important task, and especially to Kim Martins for her superb coordination.

SCOTT MASON

Comment: Even a modest object, with a certain quality of attention paid to it, may evoke feelings that go well beyond its everyday utilitarian function. This poem surprises us in its third line, not in a gratuitous way but in its stunning shift to a different but clearly related past moment and (literally) formative experience—yet one that coexists in the present. Here we find and feel an extraordinary sense of intimacy, one that approaches spirituality (think of a eucharistic chalice), transcending time.

SECOND PRIZE

Eric Lynn Cummings, New Orleans, Louisiana, USA

Piupiu of wind—

each flax strand hums a proverb

while stars eat pō.

Comment: Each line of this haiku surprises, even astonishes, yet the poem coheres in the way that dreams or creation myths and their rituals cleave to their own compelling logic. Here, a skirt-like Māori garment of swaying flax conflates with the wind (easy to visualize), while each constituent strand “hums” a proverb (not so very hard to imagine and “hear” for those who know of rosaries), as newly appearing stars occupy—or consume—bite-sized pieces of the night sky. An ontological wonder.

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THIRD PRIZE

Debbie Strange, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada

campfire nights

we ride in on the back

of a song

Comment: This poem also holds a surprise in its third line, yet one that deepens the evocative tone established in its first. The words “campfire nights” conjure feelings of good, old-fashioned fellowship and here, in an almost mystical if secular sort of union, the poem’s protagonists join in even before they arrive. A memorable mood piece.

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FOURTH PRIZE

Chen-ou Liu, Ontario, Canada

tenth year in exile . . .

wave after wave rinsing

my shadow

Comment: The persistent “otherness” commonly felt by an exile finds a poignant natural correlate in this poem. As the years come and go, the beach waves continually advance and recede; yet they can never wash away the protagonist’s physical shadow, nor the felt sense of a shadow existence when separated from one’s “true” home—perhaps a home located on the other side of the ocean from where he or she now stands. [I’m reminded here of Dante: “You shall find out how salt is the taste of another man’s bread” (Paradiso XVII)]

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FIFTH PRIZE

Patsy Turner, Akaroa, New Zealand

wintersweet

the scans

don’t lie

Comment: The extreme concision of this haiku and the dispassionate declaration in its last two lines together help it pack an emotional wallop. One can easily imagine and relate to the protagonist casually viewing the nodule-like flowers or fruit on otherwise bare branches of the referenced shrub, only to be instantly reminded of a recent medical scan.  The seasonal reference in that shrub’s common name adds to the intimation of mortality and the poem’s overall emotional effect.