Thursday, February 28, 2013

Writing from the Soul

Last time I wrote about writing from the heart. Afterwards, I ran into a short article in a writing magazine about writing from the soul and found it interesting. We writers all write from something, don't we? From our experiences, from research, from observation, from imagination, from inspiration, from what we know, from what we feel strongly about, from the heart, and from the soul. The list goes on. No matter from what we write, we need to write with emotion. Emotion is what draws the reader into your writing. Emotion is what resonates with the reader who may or may not share your experience. That said, I would like to claify what I mean emotion. It is certainly not sentimentality. Writing with emotion rids our writing from objective reporting like a camera. Certain degree of objectivity is fine but not for the whole piece. I have learned it the hard way.

With more and more publications of my haiku, haibun, and tanka, I will update my blog at least twice a month to showcase my current status of a haiku poet, tanka poet, and haibun poet. Since I got my first haiku published in June, 2011, I have had more than a hundred (100) of haiku, haibun, and tanka appeared in twenty-two (22) international online and print journals and three anthologies, one is forthcoming. I am grateful to all the editors for having selected my work for their journals. Some of them are willing to work with me to polish my poems for publication. I am blessed.

Beginning this month, I will post one published haiku or tanka of mine with Chinese translation done by myself. This is one of my ways to say "Thank You" to my mother.

Mother's Day
my haiku tribute
to the one
who changed
the color of my sky

(A Hundred Gourds 1:3, June, 2012)

母親節
我的俳句禮物
給一個人
她改變了
我天空的顏色

(traditional Chinese)