I love haiku. So do many young writers.

At first glance haiku poetry is simple; 5 syllables on line 1, 7 syllables on line 2 and 5 syllables again on line 3. Composing haiku is achievable and clapping syllables is fun for even young children, but for skilled poets, there is so much more…

Traditional haiku hold kigo, a word to hint at or signify seasonality. For example, with four clearly defined Japanese seasons, including the word ‘dragonfly’ or ‘persimmon’ indicate not just which season, but which part of the season the poem reflects. Haiku poets may thus refer to Saijiki (dictionaries listing kigo) when composing new works.

To celebrate the Albany launch of The Shark Caller, Year Six students from across The Great Southern were invited to enter a haiku poetry competition. Thank you to Dora Adeline and the Albany Library for their help collating entries and to esteemed poets, Barbara Temperton and Maree Dawes for their generosity and wisdom in judging the entries.

Selecting four Winning entries and four Highly Commended entries was challenging. As the judges said in their report:

… All poems showed some appreciation of the sea, and some of the images made us smile. Many showed an awareness of poetic devices, such as repetition, rhyme and sibilance…

Four Highly Commended haiku were selected (congratulations Summer, Maximus, Jasmyne and Devon), and there were four winning entries. The winning haiku by Maddy, Jake, Dannon and Becky are presented below:

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Each winner received a signed copy of The Shark Caller and met with me for a Milkshake Meeting to chat about books and writing. It was a pleasure to spend time with these budding poets. Thank you to home-schooling families, teachers from Albany’s John Calvin School and Spencer Park Primary as well as everyone else involved.