haiku

noun

hai·ku ˈhī-(ˌ)kü

plural haiku or haikus

: an unrhymed verse form of Japanese origin having in English three lines containing usually five, seven, and five syllables respectively

… with the declaration of war, I was not sure what the coming spring portended. So two weeks after Pearl Harbor, I wrote in haiku: Beyond mind's torment, / Reach out and grasp a sprig of / The flowering quince.—

Toyo Suyemoto

also : a poem in this form usually having a seasonal reference

I translate haiku in one line because most Japanese haiku writers, both standard and nonstandard, treat it as a one-line form and adjust its prosody accordingly. … It has long been a tradition to present haiku in non-Japanese languages as tercets… —

Hiroaki Sato

[Tonya Foster] does not write fully traditional haiku (free-standing, improvisational, about the seasons). —

Stephanie Burt

Jacob Harris, senior software architect at The New York Times, has developed an algorithm to find accidental haikus in the paper, from the mundane: "The one thing to be / careful about is trimming / the broccoli rabe," to the poetic: "The buzzing of a / thousand bees in the tiny / curled pearl of an ear." —

Annalisa Quinn

compare tanka

Note: A haiku is an unrhymed Japanese poetic form that in English usually consists of 17 syllables arranged in three lines containing five, seven, and five syllables, respectively. A haiku expresses much and suggests more in just a few words. The form first emerged in Japanese literature in the 17th century (though it did not become known by the name haiku until the 19th century) when Bashō, a Japanese poet considered by many to be the greatest practitioner of the form, elevated it to a highly refined art. A poem written in the haiku form or a modification of it in a language other than Japanese is also called a haiku. The Imagist poets of the early 20th century helped popularize the form in English.

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A haiku is an unrhymed Japanese poetic form that consists of 17 syllables arranged in three lines containing five, seven, and five syllables, respectively. A haiku expresses much and suggests more in the fewest possible words. The form gained distinction in the 17th century, when Basho, a Japanese poet considered the greatest practitioner of the form, elevated it to a highly refined art. It remains Japan’s most popular poetic form. The Imagist poets (1912–30) and others have imitated the form in English and other languages.

Example Sentences

He has written many beautiful haiku.

Recent Examples on the Web The evening—which also featured a flower crown station, live music, and on-the-spot haikus—raised $2.9 million for the Public. —

The Editors, Town & Country, 13 June 2023 Thanks to everyone who entered this year’s haiku contest. —

John Kelly, Washington Post, 19 Mar. 2023 Nguyen responded: Not quite a haiku / Syllables short by a few / Five seven five, too. —

George Varga, San Diego Union-Tribune, 23 May 2023 OpenAI’s release of ChatGPT in November 2022 took the internet by storm with its ability to generate content ranging from haikus to short stories in human-sounding prose. —

Michelle Cheng, Quartz, 12 May 2023 Are your people getting Christa’s haikus constantly? —

Fortune Editors, Fortune, 20 Apr. 2023 The tool offers recommendations, answers questions, helps users make plans and, according to the company, can write a haiku in seconds. —

From Cnn's Krystal Hur, Nicole Goodkind, Alicia Wallace, Bryan Mena, Elisabeth Buchwald and Anna Bahney, CNN, 27 Apr. 2023 Arata Isozaki was born on July 23, 1931, in Oita on Japan’s southern Kyushu region, where his father ran a prominent transport company and relaxed by writing haiku. —

Brian Murphy, Washington Post, 30 Dec. 2022 Patiently, her brushes yielded minimalist geometric configurations, like visual haiku, in stark black-and-white and later in radiant colors: triangles and trapezoids, curvaceous shells, rondos and diamonds floating in a pristine white-canvas universe. —

New York Times, 13 Feb. 2022 See More

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'haiku.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.