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ŠEĆER U TRAVI 

SUGAR IN THE GRASS

Vlasta Molinar

Haiku

Hrvatski-engleski

Uvez: Meki s klapnama

Br. str: 108

Format: A5

Maloprodajna cijena 99,75 kn (13,50 €)

(Iz knjige Vlaste Molinar ŠEĆER U TRAVI haiku pjesništvo/SUGAR IN THE GRASS haiku)

Proslov

Pjesnikinja Vlasta Molinar objavila je dosad tri poetske zbirke (Hvala Ti, 1999.; O ljubavi Tvojoj, 2013. i Zapjevaj, Gospodaru, 2017.), a ovom najnovijom, koja nosi naslov Šećer u travi, okušala se i u haiku. Šećer u travi obuhvaća 131 haiku i 5 waka koji su razvrstani u četiri tematske cjeline, okupljene ugođajem godišnjih doba, počevši s proljećem (Miris na dar), preko ljeta (Sunčevo blistavilo), jeseni (Prvi žuti list), pa do zime (Sjaje snježne pahulje). Posebnu vrijednost knjizi daje dvojezičnost – svi tekstovi u njoj prevedeni su i na engleski jezik, a prevela ih je sama autorica, budući da je profesorica hrvatskog i engleskog jezika.

Kako doživjeti haiku? I kako ga pisati? To nije moguće eksplicitno i potpuno izreći, pogotovo ne u ovom novovjekom dobu. Iako je haiku krajnje jednostavan i elementarno životan, ne da se pojednostavljeno rabiti i poimati. Jedino ga možemo prepoznati i to onda kad njegovom iskrom uspijemo zapaliti vlastiti plamičak i osvijetliti iznutra isti doživljaj kojim je i napisan. Duhu haikua svojstveno je „umijeće oduzimanja“ pa on govori prazninama više no riječima. Ta igra punoće i praznine koja je samo prividna, jer je ispunjena nevidljivom i još čišćom puninom, može se dočarati opet samo haiku pjesmom poput one Sodôove (Yamaguchi Sodô 1642. – 1716.) o prazno-punoj kolibi: Ničega u njoj: / Koliba u proljeće – / u njoj je sve!

Stoga je u okviru našeg uobičajenog literarnog poimanja možda lakše izreći što haiku nije, nego što jest. A svakako nije samo trostih od 17 slogova, niti lirska minijatura, pjesnička slika ili tercet, a ponajmanje jedna strofa neke pjesme. Haiku ne treba biti poetičan, iako pokušava uhvatiti trenutak poetičnosti u stvarnosti kao takvoj. Stoga stilske figure umanjuju snagu haikua koji je lijep i bez ukrasa, onakav kakva „takvost“ jest: doslovno zbiljska, ali s jednim snom duboko u sebi, a ponegdje i s osmijehom. Možda je to najbolje izrekao matematičar i književnik, vrhunski hrvatski i priznati svjetski japanolog i istraživač japanske kulture, posebno poezije, akademik Vladimir Devidé (1925. – 2010.) u svojoj knjizi Japan – poezija i zbilja iz 1987.: …u haiku je čitav život, čitav svijet, čitav svemir sažet i koncentriran u jednom doživljaju, u jednoj senzaciji, emociji ili percepciji, koja može biti bilo što: glas neke ptice, sparina nekog ljetnog dana, kakav brežuljak u sumrak, snijeg na krovu ili na tlu, ili na lišću bambusa, otpale latice cvijeta, izmetina lastavice ili sokola i tako dalje. Haiku je nastao u sedamnaestom stoljeću iz već postojeće waka poezije i ubrzo se proširio u šire društvene slojeve Japana, postavši kroz stoljeća jedan od temeljnih simbola japanske umjetnosti.

U zbirci Šećer u travi Vlaste Molinar haiku su pisani u tradicionalnoj formi i svaki od njih ima po 17 slogova ispisanih u tercetu (5+7+5), koji uokviruje jedan doživljaj. Tako se nižu doživljajne slike iz prirode, iz svakodnevnice, iz kršćanske liturgijske godine, iz urbanog ambijenta, kao npr.: Na Gornjem gradu / top navijesti podne / – uzlete ptice. U nekima od njih doživljaj je obostran, nema subjekta i objekta, sve je jedno i priroda uzvraća pjesniku duhovitom spoznajom: U plitkoj bari / kos bi se sav kupao, / no – duge noge!

Najveća japanska haiku pjesnikinja Chiyo-ni (1703. – 1775.) napisala je haiku: Svoj miris pruža / onome tko je slomi – / grana u cvatu. Mogli bismo reći kako taj ženski rukopis, ispisan na mirišljivoj podlozi, naziremo i u Vlastinim haiku poput ovih: Kosci livadom / kose mekanu travu / – miris im na dar! i Mirišu jako / snježne đurđice sred / drvenog stola.

Iako ponegdje poetizira metaforama i epitetima, čega se većina pjesnika teško odriče, a u nekim haiku doživljaj nam ostaje pomalo sakriven, Vlasta Molinar je ovom zbirkom ipak odlučno krenula putem tragača haiku staze koju je jednom davno utabao najveći japanski haiku majstor Matsuo Bashô (1644. – 1694.), a potom osvrnuvši se, dugo nije vidio nikoga iza sebe na njoj, iako su ga mnogi pokušavali slijediti: O, ovom stazom / za jesenjeg sumraka / nitko ne ide. Jer teško je japanski haiku, koji je ujedno i „najjapanskija“ umjetnost, pisati i u Japanu, a kamoli u Hrvatskoj, ili bilo gdje drugdje. A ipak, brojni među nama, hvala Bogu, to još pokušavaju, tražeći načine kako ga pripitomiti i duhovno udomiti. Jer ljepota, istina i čistoća koje haiku pokušava doseći, zajedničke su vrijednosti svim ljudima, a savršene su sabrane u Jednom koji može biti bliz svakome od nas.

Ružica Martinović-Vlahović

Prologue

Poetess Vlasta Molinar has published so far the three collections of poetry (Thank you, 1999; About your love, 2013 and Start singing, the Lord, 2017), and with this, the newest one, entitled Sugar in the grass, she has tried her skill in haiku, too. Sugar in the grass includes 131 haiku and 5 waka which are classified into four thematic wholes, gathered by the atmosphere of the seasons of the year, beginning with spring (Scent is a gift), then summer (Glitter of the sun), autumn (The first yellow leaf) and winter (Snow-flakes shine).

A special value of this book is bilingualism – all the texts in it have been translated into English, and they have been translated by the author herself, as she is a teacher of the Croatian and the English language.

How to experience haiku? And how to write it? It is not possible to say explicitly and fully, especially not in these modern times. Although haiku is extremely simple and elementarily existential, it cannot be in a simplified manner used and understood. We can only recognize it, and it is when we, by its spark, succeed to kindle our own tiny flame and illuminate from inside the same experience by which it is written. The skill of subtraction is typical of the spirit of haiku, so it speaks by gaps more than words. This game of fullness and emptiness that is only seeming, for it is filled with invisible and even purer fullness, can be conjured up again only by haiku as it is Sodô’s (Yamaguchi Sodô, 1642 – 1716) about an empty-full hut: There’s nothing in it: /A hut in the spring – / all is in it!

Therefore, in the framework of our usual literary understanding, it is perhaps more easy to express what haiku is not, than what it is. And certainly it is not only the triplet consisting of 17 syllables, nor a lyric miniature, a poetic picture or a triplet and least of all one stanza of a certain poem. There is no need for haiku to be poetic, although it tries to catch a moment of poetic quality in reality as such. Therefore the figured language lessens the power of haiku which is beautiful without adornments, such as depths of reality are: literally real, but with a dream deeply in itself, and here and there with a smile, too. Perhaps it was best expressed by a mathematician and a writer, a superior Croatian and an acknowledged world’s researcher of the Japanese culture, especially poetry, the academician Vladimir Devidé (1925 – 2010) in his book Japan – poetry and reality, 1987: …in haiku there is the whole life, the whole world, the whole universe condensed and concentrated in a single experience, in a single sensation, emotion or perception that can be anything: a call of a bird, the sultriness of a summer day, a small hill in twilight, a snow on a roof or a ground, or on the leaves of a bamboo, the fallen petals of a flower, the swallow’s or falcon’s droppings etc. Haiku emerged in the 17th century from already existing waka and it soon spread into wider social classes of Japan, developing through the centuries into one of the basic symbols of Japanese art.

In Vlasta Molinar’s book, Sugar in the grass haiku have been written in a traditional form and each of them has 17 syllables written as a triplet (5+7+5), which frames a single experience. So there is the sequence of experienced pictures from nature, from everyday life, from Christian liturgical year, from urban ambiances, like for example: In the Upper town / cannon announces noon / – birds rise in the air. In some of them, the experience is mutual, there is no subject and object, everything is the oneness, and the nature repays the poet with a witty cognition: In the shallow plash / blackbird would like to bathe all / over, but – long legs!

The greatest Japanese haiku poetess Chiyo-ni (1703 – 1775) wrote haiku: It offers its scent / to that one who breaks it – / the blossoming branch. We could say that this female writing, written on the scented basis, we catch glimpses of in Vlasta’s haiku, too, like these ones: The mowers mow the / soft grasses on the meadow / – the scent is a gift! And: Snow-white lilies of / the valley smell intensely / amid a table.

Though she here and there poetizes with metaphors and epithets, which the majority of poets can hardly give up, and though in some haiku the experience remains slightly hidden, Vlasta Molinar, with this book, has resolutely headed toward searching haiku pathway that once long ago paved the greatest Japanese haiku master Matsuo Bashô (1644 – 1694), and then, turning back, he did not see on it, for a long time, anybody behind himself, though many tried to follow him: Oh, by this pathway / during autumnal twilight / nobody goes. For it is difficult to write Japanese haiku even in Japan, not to mention in Croatia, or anywhere else, and haiku is “the most Japanese” art. And yet, plenty of us, thank God, still keep trying it, searching for the ways how to tame it and place spiritually. For beauty, truth and purity that haiku tries to reach, are common values for all the people, but the perfect ones are gathered in the One who can be close to all of us.

Ružica Martinović-Vlahović