Haiku has been written and published in the Balkans for five decades. That is enough time for the poetic form to develop and show its possibilities. At first it was thought that haiku only served to record interesting perceptions, and today we know that haiku has a literary range as wide and deep as any other literary form. Through haiku everything can be expressed: joy and pain, thinking, one can protest or agitate, express drama, historical truths or futuristic visions and all this in many different ways, individual styles and poetic genres.
Balkan's haiku developed through our own practice but also through interaction with haiku poetry that originated in Europe, America and Japan. The latter was especially important. The democratic changes of Japanese society after the WW2 have led to a dynamic development in the field of literature. Already Japanese poets who as imperial soldiers resided in countries outside of Japan saw the cultural limitations of traditional haiku and the importance of a multicultural approach to haiku poetry. New times that have accelerated cultural exchange with the world have highlighted the need to transcend local cultural boundaries in traditional literature. New concepts in the methods of writing and understanding haiku aimed at the universality of artistic expression have led to great changes. Especially important was the appearance of the "Dictionary of Keywords" published in 1990 by the poet Ban'ya Natsuishi (1). That book made methodical work with symbolic words completely universal, leaving the culturally conditioned system of seasonal words ("kigo"). This does not mean that the new concepts have abolished the old values, but only that they have overcome their limitations.
Throughout the Balkans, as well as in Serbia, haiku has been widely accepted from the very beginning. As in few other regions, haiku is written equally by the people and celebrated poets. That is why, perhaps, before in some other countries, haiku in Serbia reached the level of real literature with all the individual and genre richness. Moreover, haiku in Serbia is completely contemporary literature (could literature be outdated?) And the editor made an effort, engaging his quarter of a century of international experience in editing haiku poetry, to show and prove it in this anthology. Gone are the days when haiku poets in Serbia were a "religious sect" (2) and haiku "Guest from the East" (3) - the guest became domesticated thanks to the talent and perseverance of local poets, but also the dedicated editorial work of many enthusiasts.
Let's see why this collection of Serbian haiku is contemporary, and here is the most important thematic analysis. Here are the topics that Serbian poets "sang" about: mirror, egg on the grave (memorial service), surgery, voices, devil, legs (body part), pregnancy, Japan (state), monument to a hero, lion (disaster), infusion, source, guitar (music), shajkaca (war), workers, light, Kosovo field (history), graves of freemen, divorce, dogs (sweetheart), sleep, defloration, Gypsies, newcomer, Auschwitz (history), garbage, soldiers, construction site, woman ( softcore), Virgin, lantern, traffic, sparrow, parents, hand (body part), prison cell, graves, Serbian (language), invalid, greenery, shells, vase, chickens, solitude, monument, future, mushrooms, rain, umbrella , south. This thematic spectrum is undoubtedly completely contemporary. It is enough to look only at the so-called "women's letter" and to find three interesting topics in it: defloration, pregnancy and divorce, according to which haiku poets are more contemporary than authors in Serbian film. However, even if we look at the stylistic, even religious themes, which are not part of the contemporary opus, are treated contemporary. For example, Desanka's relationship to the Mother of God is not doctrinal, but human, maternal: she sees in her first of all a mother, and Jesus is no God there, but an ordinary baby. A detailed thematic analysis would show many very interesting things that would be disturbing even for those who are well acquainted with Serbian society and culture. Perhaps one could even conclude that Serbian haiku poets are avant-garde among writers and artists in Serbia.
When choosing the poems, in addition to the thematic analysis, my basic guide was the poetic sincerity and associative power (metaphorical power or surplus meaning) of the poems. Spoken in ordinary language: poetic vitality and the power of poems. In that sense, I did not make any compromises and that is why I believe that in front of the readers and the professional audience, there is an exciting poetry reading that speaks about the bright future of Serbian haiku.
Footnotes:
1) A brief sketch of Ban'ya Nacuishi's keyword dictionary is provided in Appendix No.1
(2) In an interview, not without sympathy, Desanka said that haiku poets are like a religious sect.
(3) Book with the name "Guest from the East" by dr. Zivona Zivkovic, published in 1996 in Prosveta Nis, is the only book in the world of literary criticism of haiku poetry based on the foundations of general literature and not on Japanese culture.
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