Allyson Whipple

Haiku and a Cup of Tea

  • The Best of It: Mid-April Edition

    The Best of It: Mid-April Edition

    1. The Spare Parts podcast
    2. Getting a better china cabinet for my teacup collection (for a good price at an estate sale, no less)
    3. Seeing how much fun Maybelle has at Grateful Pets
    4. The banh mi at Truc Lam
    5. Getting a new furnace in the off-season
    Captured with VisionCamera by mrousavy
  • Haiku Girl Summer Returns Soon!

    Haiku Girl Summer Returns Soon!

    While Frogpond is keeping me busy, I couldn’t let 2025 go by without a third year of Haiku Girl Summer. I adore running this journal!

    As with the past two years, the journal starts on June 1st and ends on September 1st. (I used September 1st as a surprise bonus post for the past two years, but that caused confusion last year, so now I’m just making it an official part of the run.

    In order to have poems ready for June 1st, submissions open on May 15th. I can’t wait to see your summer haiku and senryu!

    I enjoyed the different perspectives that the guest editors brought to the journal last year. Although I haven’t set up a formal sign-up system yet, I would love to work with guest editors again. If you’re interested in taking part, you can reach me at allyson@allysonwhipple.com.

    Please note that I have updated the guidelines for 2025, including a change to the submission period. Please review the updated guidelines here: https://haikugirlsummer.substack.com/p/submission-information

  • The Best of It: This is 41 Edition

    The Best of It: This is 41 Edition

    1. Going to brunch at Nadine’s Hash House with some of my favorite neighbors.
    2. That I share a birthday with one of my neighbors.
    3. My birthday buddy having a fabulous party that encouraged us to get fabulous.
    4. Ending the night at Stew’s with my brunch friends.
    5. The chance to attend a baseball game.
  • A Buson Challenge Reading List

    A Buson Challenge Reading List

    The day before my birthday, I completed a second round of the Buson Challenge. This time, I had friends joining me via email, Discord, and WhatsApp. Though I had a bigger group of writing buddies, this go-around was a bigger struggle than last year. Winter is not my most creative time, and the state of the world really has me down. Plus, my job is intense (and I’m unhappy in my current role). There’s been a lot weighing on my mind, and that never makes for a smooth writing experience.

    But the point of the Buson Challenge, for me, is that it’s a time-bound period in which you commit to showing up no matter what. And as always, such a big project reveals new insights. I’m still pondering some of the ideas that surfaced for me, so more on those later. But I did want to share the reading list I used this time around.

    I didn’t go into Round 2 expecting to come up with a reading list. But as I was communicating with my fellow writing buddies, I often found myself referencing texts I thought would be helpful. Many of these are reference texts or educational essays; some are more general writing advice. But they all served a purpose in some way. Some of them might seem out of place for a haiku challenge. I certainly was surprised to find myself reaching for a handbook on metrical verse in Week 2! But when creative intuition calls, you follow.

    Almanacs and Saijiki

    The Old Farmer’s Almanac (use the one for the current year)

    Haiku World: An International Poetry Almanac by William J. Higginson

    A Dictionary of Haiku Classified by Season Words with Traditional and Modern Methods by Jane Reichhold. (Available as a PDF at https://thehaikufoundation.org/omeka/items/show/1798)

    The Five Hundred Essential Japanese Season Words by Kenkichi Yamamoto (Available as a PDF at https://thehaikufoundation.org/omeka/items/show/821)

    Haiku Scholarship

    “A Definition of Haiku” by Michael Dylan Welch (Available here: https://www.graceguts.com/essays/a-definition-of-haiku)

    “Fragment and Phrase Theory” by Jane Reichhold (Available here: https://thehaikufoundation.org/omeka/items/show/781)

    “Beyond the Haiku Moment: Bashō, Buson, and Modern Haiku Myths” by Haruo Shirane (Available here: https://thehaikufoundation.org/juxta/juxta-1-1/beyond-the-haiku-moment-basho-buson-and-modern-haiku-myths/)

    Poetry Pea S7E33: Madku Workshop with Bona M. Santos. Available here: https://poetrypea.com/s7e33-madku-featuring-west-coast-poet-bona-m-santos/

    Additional Resources

    Rules for the Dance: A Handbook for Writing and Reading Metrical Verse by Mary Oliver

    “Belief and Technique for Modern Prose” by Jack Kerouac (Available here: https://writing.upenn.edu/~afilreis/88v/kerouac-technique.html)

    Bernadette Mayer’s list of journal ideas and writing experiments: https://www.writing.upenn.edu/library/Mayer-Bernadette_Experiments.html 

    Natalie Goldberg’s 7 Rules for Writing Practice from Writing Down the Bones (Available as a PDF here: https://lauradavis.net/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/Rules-of-Writing-Practice.pdf)

    “The Etiquette of Freedom” by Gary Snyder from The Practice of the Wild. (Available as a PDF here: https://bewildrewild.org/wp-content/uploads/The-Practice-of-the-Wild-by-Gary-Snyder.pdf)

  • The Best of It: Spring Has Sprung Edition

    1. First fish fry of the season at the Soulard Legion!
    2. The first fish fry turning into another night of Soulard revelry
    3. Designing and ordering my “Fish Fry A-FISH-ionado” t-shirt even though the season already started. (Better lat than never . . .)
    4. It’s nice enough to walk Maybelle regularly
    5. The sandwiches John makes me for lunch

  • Sunday Sharing: At the Start of Spring

    I think spring is finally here to stay in St. Louis! I know March can be finicky, but the current weekend weather gives me hope.

    I had two haiku appear in print in the past few weeks! First, I made my first appearance in Mayfly. Although my copy hasn’t arrived yet, my dad got his copy, so I know it’s out. Since I can’t show a photo, this is my piece:

    anniversary
    the faded red canvas
    of our camping chairs

    I also had two pieces appear in Trash Panda, which is my favorite haiku journal.

    Finally, I was thrilled to discover that I received an honorable mention in the February 2025 Kukai at The Haiku Foundation!

  • The Best of It: End of February Edition

    The Best of It: End of February Edition

    1. Attending the special Valentine’s Day dinner at Stew’s
    2. The incredible offerings at this year’s Taste of Soulard
    3. Maybelle had a great time at the Pet Parade
    4. Hosting Mardi Gras breakfast on parade day
    5. I had the chance to eat at House of Wong one more time before they closed
  • Sunday Sharing: Winter Poems

    Sunday Sharing: Winter Poems

    This year’s iteration of the Buson Challenge might feel like a bit of a slog, but the good news is that I have more winter poems than ever before! And two have gotten published in the last few weeks.

    I have four pieces over at Cold Moon Journal, one which is new, and three older pieces that I’m happy have a home. You can view them at the journal site and on Instagram.

    I also am making my first appearance in the Sense & Sensibility journal with a new haiku. I believe it’s Maybelle’s first published appearance as well! You can find the new issue here.

    And with that, it’s hard to believe we’re into March already! I officially step into the managing editor role of Frogpond this month, and I have about 5 weeks left of the Buson Challenge. Plus, of course, slowly chipping away at the Culinary Saijiki manuscript. And counting down the days to the Cardinals home opener, the Route 66 Literary Festival, and Haiku North America . . .

  • The Best of It: Mid-February Edition

    The Best of It: Mid-February Edition

    1. Hosting my very first afternoon tea.
    2. The Lunar New Year tea box from The Steeping Room.
    3. St. Louis Diner Tamales.
    4. Getting to attend the online Pilates Empowerment Summit and fulfill a number of continuing education credits.
    5. A new laptop that is able to run all of the software I need to fulfill my creative pursuits.
  • Some Recent Publications

    Some Recent Publications

    I spent the better part of 2024 trying and failing to get in the habit of sharing my published work more often. On top of that, there’s the ongoing concern about how anything posted to a Meta site (Facebook, Instagram, Threads) is being used to train their AI. (I’m not even considering the dumpster fire that is Xitter up for discussion.) Of course, these days putting anything on the internet runs the risk of it being scraped to train AI without our consent, but there’s only so much anyone can do at this point. I’m about to go on a further tangent about how our riches tech bros are actively enabling fascism, but that’s not the point of this post.

    Anyway, since my greatest source of creative control is through my own website that I pay for, I’m going to focus on posting my creative accomplishments here more regularly. So without further ado, here are some recent publication credits for 2025. I hope to make this a regular series (and come up with a witter title for it).

    I was featured on Haiku Poet Word Search.

    I have work in To Live Here: Haiku for the Victims of Hurricane Helene. All proceeds go to support hurricane disaster relief efforts.

    I have two haiku in the Winter 2024/2025 edition of Wales Haiku Journal

    I’m also pretty sure I’ve submitted more work in the first six weeks of the year than I did in all of 2024, so from a poetic standpoint, 2025 is off to a good start!

    I created a pamphlet called 100 St. Louis Season Words, a combination of classical and region-specific haiku to support local haiku practice. It’s also available as a printable PDF on my Buy Me a Coffee page. If you don’t own a printer (my 15-year-old laser printer just gave up the ghost) and want a copy, send me an email and I’ll get one in the mail for you!