THE BRITISH HAIKU SOCIETY AWARDS 2023 – RESULTS

HAIKU SECTION
The David Cobb Haiku Award
Judges – Klaus-Dieter Wirth and Caroline Skanne
The winners are Heather Lurie, New Zealand and John Barlow, UK
The runners-up are Jay Friedenberg, USA and Frank Hooven, USA

Klaus-Dieter Wirth writes:
Judging haiku is a delicate job. Firstly, it is true, the known basic criteria to be applied are adecisive help in separating the wheat from the chaff: these are the fundamental asymmetry
based on the three-part form and the two-part content with its incorporated caesura, aproper openness for further interpretations, the renunciation of any personal comment, and,as a matter of course, the essential surprise effect.
This initial step is in general quickly done with, in my experience, an average yield of only
about 5 per cent with the consequence that this remaining humus makes any further cutting
down all the more difficult inevitably causing some discomfort for the juror.
Hence evaluation standards within this last framework obviously depend on the very
individual experiences made with the haiku and overall conceptions of poetry as such.
Winner – Heather Lurie, New Zealandstanding against
a city of stars
the stag
In this sense, the winner haiku displayed the following decisive aspects: a rhythmicallyconvincing focus on the target object, the associated strong use of alliteration (st) for support,
the bold image connecting the human and celestial spheres (a city of stars), the enormous
contrast between the universe and a single living individual besides virtually immovableagainst any change of location.
Runner-up – Jay Friedenberg, USA
sunsetwaves glitter
into pointillist light

The runner-up text reveals similar qualities though in a smaller range, that is: presenting the
span from a greater but earthly natural phenomenon (sunset) to a much smaller one (waves),
beguiling with a sparkling play of sounds (s, t, l, i) which exactly illustrates the content of thestatement (glitter) while delicately transitioning to the human-artistic realm of pointillism, aperfect comparison!
Honourable Mentions:Of the Honourable Mentions examples, the first is again initially appealing due to its
connection between a celestial body (moon) and an object from the human-creative sphere(piano) sharing a similar colour (ivory). Moreover, there are the optical comparisons between
the slenderness of fingers and moonbeams apart from the fact that both are stroking those
keys but gently. Finally, a delicate synaesthesia comes into play with the acousticallyextremely subtle keystrokes.
tapering fingers
you stroke ivory keys
with moonlight— Olive Malcolm, UK
The second example even tops this rhetorical device with its triple use employing scent,vision, and absent (!) sounds.
scented candle
the way she speaks
without words— Ravi Kiran, India
The third is convincing due to its consistent shift from the concrete to the abstract whenstarting from rather inconspicuous natural objects (leaves) to a special mental state (darkmind). At the same time the whole process is impressively carried forward again with the helpof alliteration yet in addition supported by the function of an anaphora (three times an initial
d at the beginning of the verse) which leads to a special conciseness of the whole message.
dripping leaves
dank airdark mind— Sarah Edwards, Wales

Caroline Skanne writes:
Winner – John Barlow, UK
a sedge warbler’s mimicry wind-torn clouds

The slightly chaotic quality to this poem skilfully mimics the sedge warbler’s song. This
jumbled musicality that sets the tone of the poem, feels at once spontaneous yet practised,lending it an effortlessness that can be so hard to achieve. Technically, it’s a well-craftedhaiku, incorporating an effective pivot in its one-line presentation, as well as the repeated ‘w’sound tying ‘warbler’s’ with ‘wind-torn’. The word choice ‘mimicry’ further sparks theimagination, inviting the reader to think of likely/unlikely sounds. ‘sedge’ adds context to thepoem, and ‘warbler’, music. Hence, we don’t need to be familiar with the specific bird to get
the gist of its mimicry. It’s one of those deceptively simple poems with rewarding depth/s thatwork/s on different levels. Multisensory and playful, specific yet accessible, the poem
smoothly fuses its various elements. Indeed, the poem seems to continuously & beautifully
scatter & reassemble in the mind—into song, wind, cloud.
Runner-up – Frank Hooven, USA
clearing skies
wind ruffles the waterin a little red wagon
While not explicitly stated, here in ‘a little red wagon’, is the whole sky. Above all, this poem
welcomes us to really take notice. There’s a gentle nod to The Red Wheelbarrow by Williams
Carlos Williams in the delicate images that make up this poem. As we further explore thespace between these images, we are rewarded with uncovering the subtle details, shifts, andrelationships. It’s the understatement of this haiku that makes it so effective. But also, in theway each word seems to be just right, and at just the right place. If read out loud, or even
quietly in the mind, you’ll hear the barely-there music that flows through this quiet whisperof a poem. Its echo lingering long after being read.

Honourable Mentions:
dusting of snow
the soft rhetoricof a fairy tale
— Sharon Martina, USA
I’ve lost myself in this poem more than a few times now. Its light-as-snow touch andemotional depth, giving it something of a spell-like quality. There’s a lot to delve into in thisdeftly delivered poem, perhaps even childhood itself.
winter sun
more shadow
than tree— Marjolein Rotsteeg, The Netherlands
A concentrated poem, offering so much in just six simple words. And it’s just this simplicity
that expands the poem, infusing it with feeling. I could write about where this poem takes
me, but I think I’d rather leave the reader to make their own discoveries.

dipper song
the smoothness of stones
at rest in the beck
— John Barlow, UK
Sometimes, if we’re lucky enough, a dipper might stop for a while and sing. And maybe as wehear this song, we will pause long enough to also notice ‘the smoothness of stones/at rest in
the beck.’ Haiku is about connection/s, and this poem seems to honour just that.
It was a pleasure reading and rereading the entries to the 2023 BHS Awards, thanks for theprivilege.

TANKA SECTION
The Linda Jeannette Ward Tanka Award
Judges – David Terelinck and Bryan Rickert
The winners are Pamela A. Babusci, USA and Susan Burch, USA
The runners-up are Debbie Strange, Canada and Susan Burch, USA

David Terelinck writes:
It’s not easy to select a dozen shortlisted poems from 203 submissions, then winnow this towinner, runner-up, three honourable mentions. I objectively considered tanka subject,structure, poetic devices, word choices, imagery, inferred emotions, original metaphors. In
arriving at the final 5 tanka, it is inevitable that some good short-listed tanka, that may haveplaced under a different judge, had to be passed over.
Winner – Pamela A. Babusci, USA
sitting alone
beneathopium stars
a womanin deep pain
Defying classical structure, this 10-word tanka works because of the brevity and sharp
imagery. We need not know the source of this pain; it is enough to know the woman shoulders
it alone, finds relief beneath the stars. Immersion in nature increases dopamine and serotoninin our brains to become a powerful antidepressant. Star bathing can reduce emotional stressand heartache, improve general wellbeing. There is indeed an opiate in nature (independentof the poppy) that can soothe troubled souls and bring peace from pain. Those who have satalone under the quietude of star-filled skies will appreciate the restorative power of such
moments. The use of the phrase “opium stars” binds this tanka together in an unforgettablemanner.

Runner-up – Debbie Strange, Canada
sunbeams sift
between the bonesof our barnmucking out stalls
has never felt so holy
Opening with a gentle shasei, this tanka assumes a deeper meaning in the closing metaphor.
Cleaning straw and manure from animal stalls takes on new meaning in the glow of lightbetween the boards; honest labour becomes devotion. A ‘Hand of God’ moment we liken towhen fall-streaks appear through clouds. The tanka has subtle alliteration with a solid
structure. It has a satisfying elliptical ending as the sense of a holy task links back to thesunbeams often seen in classical religious paintings. The author is unobtrusive, and there issufficient dreaming room for the reader to insert themselves into the scene.

Honourable Mentions:red-faced warbler…
he tells everyone
they’re stealing
his clothes
at the nursing home
— Susan Burch, USA
A poignant tanka of someone who may have dementia. His constant song likely a backgroundhum to those hearing it daily. Yet there are warblers and other birds that practice nest
material kleptoparasitism. This reader ponders the balance of truth to this warbler’s claim.
cold silencein the classroom
the boy too blandfor bullies to noticeleaves an empty chair— Tracy Davidson, UK
A sad tanka of loss and grief. What has happened to this boy overlooked by everyone? Has hedied by suicide? A lack of attention, love and friends can be as damaging to self-esteem andlife as relentless bullying.
all weekend
she saw it coming
and now the winds
have torn the dark
the silence of the stars— Clare McCotter, Northern IrelandSo much dreaming room in this tanka that leaves many questions. Something powerful anddevastating, that the narrator knew was coming, has happened; it has caused a rift in the dark
and given voice to stars. Powerful and enigmatic.

Bryan Rickert writes:
I would like to thank Ms. Stoyanova and the BHS for honoring me with the opportunity tojudge the tanka section of this contest. All of the poems were read multiple times over thecourse of several weeks and were eventually eliminated to my top five picks. This was difficult
because so many wonderful tanka resonated with me through the reading period but I foundmyself returning to these same five time and time again.
Winner – Susan Burch, USA
learning
how strong I am
on my own
the soufflé
starting to rise
In a wonderfully concise way, this poet talks about finding their strength and yet compares it
to a culinary dish that is delicate and temperamental. The tanka accurately demonstrates thatsometimes when we find our strength, it is a precarious situation and is fraught with difficulty
and challenge. There is always the fear of falling flat, but when we make it, we become atreasured and valuable thing. Soufflé, being the past particle of the word soufflé, means toblow, breath, or inflate. The reader cannot help but imagine the poet starting a new life on
their own, inhaling deeply and rising to the occasion.
Runner-up – Susan Burch, USA
red-faced warbler…
he tells everyone
they’re stealing
his clothes
at the nursing home
Without actually stating that the gentleman in the nursing home is angry, this tanka
graphically demonstrates an emotional situation by juxtaposing a person to a red-faced bird.
The reader is instantly taken to the visual of an older angry man, complaining to the worldabout problems that are big to him, but might seem small to others. This poem strikes deeply
at the fears that many people have, the fear of working your whole life for your home, foryour children and your spouse only to end up an angry person who has been reduced toworrying about the things that we take for granted right now. The things we probably haveplenty of - socks, pants, and shirts. Will there be anyone there for us later who will listen andcare or will we sing like a red-faced bird in the hopes that someone, anyone, will respond?

Honourable Mentions:lay my bodyby the cherry tree
it’s high time
we fedthe vultures too— Susan Burch, USA
This tanka has a beautiful lyrical quality that speaks so well about the transience of our timehere and the poet’s willingness to see all living creatures with equity.
a thin slice of carrot
in the vegetable soup—
her voice lingers
over the word
misogyny— Julie Bloss Kelsey, USA
Even though there is nothing funny about misogyny, this poet brilliantly uses humor to convey
larger ideas and insight into social roles and patriarchy.
sunbeams sift
between the bonesof our barnmucking out stalls
has never felt so holy
— Debbie Strange, Canada
Through this beautiful tanka, the poet demonstrates that wonderful moments ofenlightenment and grace are not limited to structured times of church and prayer. If we stayconnected to the moment, we can find a poetic truth that transcends time and place.
Poets wrote on themes that are deeply pertinent to our world today. I appreciated the humor
and playfulness of many of the entries, as a way to handle difficulty. Some poets even
invented new words, and illustrated the meanings subtly by the shapes of their tanka.
Illustrated here – a great sense of loss. A love and care for nature and ecology. Timeless family
love. Lament for the difficulties in personal relationships. We yearn for freedom. Time flows
through us, and nature and the seasons of human life are mirrored. We open ourselves totransformation and realizations. We question.
Grateful for tanka, a deeply emotional and beautifully shaped vessel for all of this – capableof elasticity in contour and weight, our lyrical heritage, our little songs. And grateful to thesepoets who wrote and sent these poems. It was an honor and pleasure to read your tanka andto learn from all of them.

HAIBUN SECTION
The Ken and Noragh Jones Haibun Award
Judge – Kala Ramesh
The winner is Alice Wanderer, Australia
The runner-up is Shalini Pattabiraman, Scotland

Kala Ramesh writes:
At the outset, I would like to thank the British Haiku Society for entrusting me with judging
their haibun contest. I had 67 entries and judging haibun isn’t easy. I read the poems several
times, and each time I read them all together at one go, for I felt the flow — and consequently
my judgement — might falter if I read them piecemeal.
What is haibun, if not an extension of a haiku that gives us more leeway to carry a story
forward? The ‘link and shift’ that we employ is a precious gift from the Japanese that can beused extensively in all art forms. With conviction, I say that ‘resonance’ has a major role toplay in haibun. Nobuyuki Yuasa says, “In good haibun, the prose deepens the understandingof the poetry, and the poetry gives greater energy to the prose. The relationship is like thatbetween the moon and the earth: each makes the other more beautiful.” (Blithe Spirit, Sept
2000).
When I came into haibun in 2005, editors were constantly talking about haikai prose inhaibun. Why does no one think haikai prose is important or relevant in haibun today? Whenlanguage becomes flamboyant and flowery, then it makes more noise than poetry. And haikaiprose is all about poetry.
Using the criteria of compelling narrative, link and shift, and resonance, all coming together
in the haikai prose mode, I have selected the winners.
Winner – Alice Wanderer, Australia
Fate Lines
On page 253 of Andrew Gordon’s A Modern History of Japan there’s a monochrome
photograph, taken in 1961. Two hands, one cupped in the other, emerge from black
shadows with the disembodied purity of a Brancusi head. But instead of polishedmarble, they are cracked clay.
No, not cracked clay. They are not cracked clay. But they do not look real. With palms
twice as wide and fingers only half the length of mine, they are calloused and fissured.
The hands of a twenty-one-year-old, “farm daughter”.
Work hands, these palms would not be able to work without pain. She could not wash
her face, caress herself or another or comfort the dying without pain.

To pray at a Shinto shrine – for a son, say, or a good harvest – you must clap your raised
hands together twice. Even so, the crop may miserably fail.
potato famine –orphan girls jostle to sightthe Southern Cross
Making skilful use of emotionally resonant images, ‘Fate Lines’ stood out for me for the useof haikai prose. The well-constructed resonance pulsating between the title, prose and haiku,
gives an added texture to each reading.
The resonance begins with the title — ‘fate lines,’ which are in our hands – the hands
resembling cracked clay – the hands of a young ‘farm daughter’, whose skin is so ‘calloused
and fissured’ that she can’t even clap her hands twice at the Shinto shrine, for a son or a good
harvest. And then the resonance is capped with an excellent first line in the haiku – ‘potato
famine.’ What agony and yet lines 2 and 3 tell us that the charm in life is still alive.

Runner-up – Shalini Pattabiraman, Scotland
Out of control
Condensation settles on glass, metal, wood, rubber, even plastic, feeding it with life.
You are awake. Pre-dawn, your eyes swivel into distinction, from sleep-washed topurposeful.
It is in the air, the spores as old as time itself. Racing over walls, growing, taking rootover the body of home—windows, corners around the foundation, the edges behindfurniture, sometimes the ceiling, like a revolt of the unseen, the invisible in hidden
spaces, unattended, unacknowledged, but growing.
You scrub. Scrub the mould out of surfaces. It clings. You scrub again. It comes back tohaunt you in dreams. You persist. Relentless in erasing it out. The skin breaks. Flushing.
Red first, then squirting warm blood.
A pause between two notes of music, the house is clean, as far as you can see—of any
dissension. But the spores are breathing. Inside the lungs, inside the bones, under thenails and the skin, they have already laid siege and you have become them.
threadbare wintera crow knocks
at the window
This haibun disturbed me. Again, such masterful storytelling with effective repetitions
enhanced the resonance. The mention of a crow in the haiku gave this haibun a Himalayansized impact. In Hindu tradition, crows are believed to serve as messengers between thephysical and the spiritual worlds. So much is left unsaid in the white spaces between the title,
prose and haiku, that with each reading the story gets deeper.
Honourable mentions:
New Buildby Clare McCotter, Northern Ireland
she is holding the key to a house he would no doubt consider a characterless assault on
design – no ludic interludes, no unexpected turns – no patina of words or fingerprints –no family heirlooms, no walls with stories to tell – seated on the stairs she eats Chinese
take away with a plastic fork – later beneath a chest of stars she will sleep on barefloorboards exhaling the dark blue faces of pansies and eucalypt leaves
open window
the wind sweeping clean
old piano keys
Very well written. Seeing the extraordinary in the ordinary.
Déjà Ku
by John Barlow, UK
There’s nothing new under the sun. It’s all been done before. We’re borrowing lines,
recycling loanwords, appropriating clichés. Still, some things are worth discovering forourselves; some things are worth following.
summer morning
again the grasshopper
lands on its shadow
Down-to-earth prose. I was clean bowled by the haiku.
Returnby Clare McCotter, Northern Ireland
three in the morning and there is no light in this un-mooned sky – you have just hungup and I can see nothing only your heart burning in a spinney of gnarled thorns – cancer,
a cakewalk, you said, compared to the depression, is back, back after all this time – youtell me all shall be well, and it shall, all shall be well for your heart is of the west and it
has come back from the place into which the light sets
no torch
through ink-black elms
the stars
The depth of emotions is understated and capped with a strong haiku.

***Administrator’s Note:
Due to unforeseen circumstances I had to fulfil the BHS Awards admin role for yet anotheryear. However, this is now my final eighth year and I am happy to announce that Nick Taylor
will take over for the 2024 BHS Awards.
I would like to express my gratitude to this years’ judges Klaus-Dieter Wirth, Caroline Skanne,David Terelinck, Bryan Rickert, and Kala Ramesh for their time and energy in producing suchwell-crafted reports! It was a pleasure working with you all.
Congratulations to the winning poets! All winners, runners-up and honourable mentions havereceived BHS Awards certificates for their achievements. The BHS is grateful to all poets who
have supported the contest over the years. In 2023 there was an 11% increase in the haiku
submissions and 4% increase in the tanka category. We received 483 haiku, 203 tanka and 67
haibun from 19 countries: Australia, Canada, Germany, India, Ireland, Malta, New Zealand,
Northern Ireland, Portugal, Romania, Scotland, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sweden, The Netherlands,
UK, Ukraine, USA, and Wales. 46% of the poets were from UK, 45% from USA, 9% from
Australia, 6% from Scotland, 5% from Canada, 4% from Germany and Wales, etc.
We are looking forward to your entries for the BHS Awards 2024!
Good luck, Nick!
Iliyana Stoyanova
BHS Awards Administrator