Haiku is not a shriek, a howl, a sigh, or a yawn; rather, it is the deep breath of life. — Santoka Taneda
I often think of my work as visual haiku. It is an attempt to evoke and suggest through as few elements as possible rather than to describe with tremendous detail. — Michael Kenna
He who creates three to five haiku poems during a lifetime is a haiku poet. He who attains to completes ten is a master. — Matsuo Basho
The author of haiku should be absent, and only the haiku present. — Anne Bancroft
The only problem
with Haiku is that you just
get started and then — Roger McGough
The haiku that reveals seventy to eighty percent of its subject is good. Those that reveal fifty to sixty percent, we never tire of. — Matsuo Basho
A book cover is a distillation. It is a haiku of the story. — Chip Kidd
Cold Mountain Son
Forever not change
I live alone
Beyond life death — Hanshan
Trees are poems that the earth writes upon the sky. — Kahlil Gibran
Architecture is a discipline that takes time and patience. If one spends enough years writing complex novels one might be able, someday, to construct a respectable haiku. — Thom Mayne
Poetry is the synthesis of hyacinths and biscuits. — Carl Sandburg
Break open
A cherry tree
And there are no flowers;
But the spring breeze
Brings forth myriad blossoms. — Ikkyu
Poetry is a mystic, sensuous mathematics of fire, smoke-stacks, waffles, pansies, people, and purple sunsets. — Carl Sandburg
Poetry is everywhere; it just needs editing. — James Tate
Short Haiku Quotes
Every day is a journey, and the journey itself is home. — Matsuo Basho
When composing a verse let there not be a hair's breath separating your mind from what you write; composition of a poem must be done in an instant, like a woodcutter felling a huge tree or a swordsman leaping at a dangerous enemy. — Matsuo Basho
What I'm trying to do is to tell young people that I teach them how to breathe before I teach the haiku. That one breath, that one breath, because the haiku keeps you alive. It keeps you going. If you learn how to breath the haiku, you learn how to breathe. If you learn how to breathe, you're much healthier. — Sonia Sanchez
What is the beauty of the haiku is that it is not simplistic. The beauty of the haiku I just said is very complex. It reaches all the complexities of our life on this Earth. Peace - that's a very complex idea, peace, so we can't get it as human beings. — Sonia Sanchez
Yoko [Ono] was showing me some of these Haiku in the original. The difference between them and Long fellow is immense. Instead of a long flowery poem the Haiku would say 'Yellow flower in white bowl on wooden table' which gives you the whole picture. — John Lennon
Remember technology does not make good work. You can still write a poem on a brown paper bag, and haiku is just as profound as the pyramids. — James Turrell
Love taught me to die with dignity that I might come forth anew in splendor. Born once of flesh, then again of fire, I was reborn a third time to the sound of my name humming haikus in heaven’s mouth. — Aberjhani
The similarity between Van Gogh, Haiku poetry, and good photography is the concern for mortality. That things are very fleeting, that there are people who are more sensitive to death than others. The threat of time is of great concern to them. And the camera is a very appropriate instrument for many. — Dennis Stock
Some of my pictures are poem-like in the sense that they are very condensed, haiku-lik. There are others that, if they were poetry, would be more like Ezra Pound. There is a lot of information in most of my pictures, but not the kind of information you see in documentary photography. There is emotional information in my photographs. — Sally Mann
The sun shines, snow falls, mountains rise and valleys sink, night deepens and pales into day, but it is only very seldom that we attend to such things. . . . When we are grasping the inexpressible meaning of these things, this is life, this is living. To do this twenty-four hours a day is the Way of Haiku. It is having life more abundantly. — Reginald Horace Blyth
I was satisfied with haiku until I met you, but now I want a Russian novel, a 50-page description of you sleeping. — Dean Young
The haiku reproduces the designating gesture of the child pointing at whatever it is (the haiku shows no partiality for the subject), merely saying: that! — Roland Barthes
A haiku is the expression of a temporary enlightenment, in which we see into the life of things. — Reginald Horace Blyth
These are some of the characteristics of the state of mind which the creation and appreciation of haiku demand: Selflessness, Loneliness, Grateful Acceptance, Wordlessness, Non-intellectuality, Contradictoriness, Humor, Freedom, Non-morality, Simplicity, Materiality, Love, and Courage. — Reginald Horace Blyth
The love of nature is religion, and that religion is poetry; these three things are one thing. This is the unspoken creed of haiku poets. — Reginald Horace Blyth
Writing a picture book is like writing 'War and Peace' in Haiku. — Mem Fox
To me, photography is not just a visual art, but something closer to poetry - or at least to some poetry, such as the haiku. — Frank Horvat
My first publication was a haiku in a children's magazine when I was 9 years old. I received one dollar for it! I gave the check to my dad for Christmas, and he framed it and hung it over his desk. — Linda Sue Park
I'm not a haiku artist, but I wanted to use the phrase 5, 7, 5 in the melody that flows over time. So the string melody, the first one is five notes, the next one is seven, and then the third one is five. — Terry Bozzio
Haiku is a particularly Zen form of poetry; for Zen detests egoism in the form of calculated effects or self-glorification of any sort. The author of haiku should be absent, and only the haiku present. — Anne Bancroft
Having examined three thousand haiku poems - two persimmons. — Masaoka Shiki
But a haiku by Buson came into his mind: 'I try to forget this senile love; a chilly autumn shower.' The gloom only grew denser. — Yasunari Kawabata
Dreams like podcast. Downloading truth in my ears. They tell me cool stuff. — Rick Riordan
Dreams like a podcast, Downloading truth in my ears. They tell me cool stuff." "Apollo?" I guess, because I figured nobody else could make a haiku that bad. He put his finger to his lips. "I'm incognito. Call me Fred." "A god named Fred? — Rick Riordan
Every week it's another opportunity to really make that work and figure out how to make it work better. And I love that it's like theater, too, and the audience, and it's so short. It's only 20 minutes. It's like a haiku or something. — Joan Cusack
It's hard to write haiku. I write long, silly Indian poems. — Jack Kerouac
Poems are language turned into art; sound and sense matter; they can be as long or longer than The Odyssey or as short or shorter than a haiku. Not very helpful. — Campbell McGrath
So many people are looking for news on the go. If you really want to understand the world, you're not going to by consuming news in the form of bite-sized haikus. I'm sorry to step up on a soapbox, but I have strong feelings about this. — Michele Norris
In Conclusion
Which quotation resonated with you best? Did you enjoy our collection of haiku quotes? Or may be you have a slogan about haiku to suggest. Let us know using our contact form.
Citation
Feel free to cite and use any of the quotes in this collection of haiku quotations. For popular citation styles(APA, Chicago, MLA), please use this citation page.
