Shiki’s advice to intermediate haiku writers
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1. Remember perspective. Large things are large, but small things are also large if seen close up.
2. Delicacy should be studied, but it cannot be applied to human affairs in seventeen syllables. It can be applied to natural objects.
3. Haiku are not logical proportions, and no process of reasoning should show on the surface.
4. Keep the words tight; put in nothing useless. 5. Cut down as much as possible on adverbs, verbs and “postpositions.”
6. Use real and imaginary pictures, but prefer real ones. Using imaginary pictures will give you both good and bad haiku, but the good ones will be rare.
From “An Introduction to Haiku” by Harold G. Henderson. 1958
