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Philip Whalen (1923-2002)
Haiku and Haiku-esque Poems

Haiku for Mike

Bouquet of HUGE
nasturtium leaves
‘HOW can I support myself?’

Early Spring

The dog writes on the window
with his nose

25:1:68

Sadly unroll sleepingbag:
The missing lid for teapot!

[Awake a moment]

Awake a moment
Mind dreams again
Red roses black-edged petals

Where Was I??

New desk, old chair
I look at them, hopelessly
Where's the man who writes
there?

IS

Here's a dragonfly
(TOTALLY)
Where it was,
that place no longer exists.

Haiku for Gary Snyder, 1960

False Senryu

A cough
waits for the bus.

Ginkakuji Michi

Morning haunted by black dragonfly
landlady pestering the garden moss

cf.
http://www.modernhaiku.org/essays/Sagan-PhilipWhalenHaiku.html
Interview with Michael McClure: All Moments Are One

Kerouac's friend, the Zen priest and poet Philip Whalen, disliked haikus, saying "Reading them is like being pecked to death."

MARK OTHER PLACE, Poems by Philip Whalen
http://www.bigbridge.org/Site/Text/Mark_O_P.html

PHILIP WHALEN WITH DRIP PORTRAIT OF HIMSELF
San Francisco 1965
Poet and Zen Master, Philip Whalen emerged from his closet with a drip painted portrait of him by Michael McClure. It looks just like him. While I spent the day with him at his apartment, I was struck by the depth of his inner peace.
(Text and photograph by Larry Keenan. All Rights Reserved.)