A Haiku Photographers Journey 1 : Good Morning Caistor

Golden sky of autumn morn
Birds circle to perch
The great industries of life

I opened my deskside curtains this morning to this scene, and intuitively reached for the nearest camera which was my Lumix G9 which had the beautiful Leica 12-60 lens on. I reached and opened the window and turned the dial to take the camera off manual, I knew the scene would not last long and auto would make working faster. I dialed in some exposure compensation because I wanted the buildings to be a silhouette to make this all about the sky, but then the birds arrived to play with my emotions, they circled and they swooped and they came to rest. Their dance became my focus. I kept firing the shutter because I knew something beautiful was happening, was this a zen moment.

The zen moment is something that interests me greatly, and is something that I have been thinking about for a few years since I read that one of my favourite street photographers, Henri Cartier Bresson, was inspired by the ‘Zen in the Art of Archery’. Is zen something about being ‘in the moment’. Zen is something that I find hard to describe, although many years ago when I was playing golf I remember a round at Felixstowe Golf Club when my ball left my club and went exactly where I wanted it to. For a few hours I just knew it would without me getting in it’s way. I did not step out of the way intentionally, I just did. For those who understand golf I shot a gross 67 that day, which meant a net 62. It was the best round of my life and one I have never repeated. Maybe I was experiencing ‘Zen in the Art of Golfing’.

Prior to opening my curtains this morning I was watching a video on Pea TV where Stanford M Forrester was talking about Haiku by the writer Jack Kerouac. Kerouac worked with some great photographers, and Forrester talked about zen. But what he also spoke of was the art of seeing rather than just looking. I remember being taught that art many years ago in the 1980s when I was training to be a press photographer. I need to rethink those early lessons and consider them against the concept of what the haiku photographer means and has potential for.

Yesterday I wrote that I was intending to watch the RPS AGM, which I did. There was a marvellous talk by a photographer called Aneesa Dawoojee who photographs many things, but her iamges of boxers are getting a lot of attention. My good friend Afzal Ansary had spoken to me about her a few days ago because he has had some good conversations with her. At some point I would like talk to her too. I will be thinking about today is where my journey in photography is heading in the future. In other news I heard from the British Haiku Society yesterday and as a result I am now a paid up member. I am enjoying spending time reading more about haiku from the resources that Paul Hickey has forwarded to me. The society looks excellent and I am pleased to be a member.

If you have any thoughts or ideas about haiku and/or haiku photography please let me know by commenting below. I would love to read them

Click here to have a look at Aneesa’s website

Click here to watch the talk about Jack Kerouac’s haiku

In a haiku world a ginko is a walk through nature observing

and as I ginko I make images of the things I notice

I then write a haiku in a moment as a response the images I make, that makes me stop to think

Finally I blog here about what the image and haiku make me think about

© Stewart Wall 2022

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *