A painter of sunflowers (A senryu)

senryu? never heard of it before. mind explaining it to me? short, yet beautiful with beautiful imagery. HUG ZARUL

You're correct about the haiku carrying a nature theme and the senryu involving humans or human nature. Tankas can be pretty much about anything, especially these days. If you look up the traditional definitions, the rules are probably more strict. I tend to adhere to the haiku and senryu with their syllabic count and themes, but even organizations devoted to both will accept nearly anything as a haiku, senryu, or tanka - which I find a bit disappointing. That said, I like the general idea of your senryu. Van Gogh is one of my favorite artists. I think your poem could say more about him - his mental instability led to his suicide attempts and the drastic move to cut off his own ear. Even with the brevity of a senryu, your second line could reflect that mental torment .... it feels like the piece would be richer if it included more than his love of sunflowers, as it was so much more that led to his self-destructive act. The way it is written right now makes it appear that his love of sunflowers drove him to it - make any sense at all? It's early here and I don't know how coherent I'm being! ~ Ronda

the arrow of your senryu as pointing at VG immediately on first read. Well put, by the way. Just to idle-curious myself, I wonder if he could hear better ... or worse ... postself-surgery. I claim my curiosity as idle only because I'm unwilling to experiment on myself to make the discovery. And because my ears don't exactly mirror one another, the left being placed a little lower on my skull than my right---or is it the reverse?---I don't even know what it'd be like to have each on the level---that is, at true horizontal---with the other. I venture the world'd deliver a different sound if that were so. My bald head of course contributes to the tilted, possibly shameful, esthetics so resulting. But I must confess I've got other deficits that carry even more shame than the external auditory apparati. (I know, I know, the plural of apparatus is apparatuses usually, but I like apparati.) Oh, well, now I bore myself. Not a good thing. As Martha Stewart might say. Thanx, Chuck PS: Your title's plainly a good one. At least in my book. And I do prefer, as you've done here, a sort of sideways reference rather than one front on.

sorry, became distracted with the whole lopsided ear thing. I have uneven ear piercing, does that count? Though that was due to human stupidity, not genetics. anyway.... Cool mini-tribute to VanGogh. What was the real reason he cut his ear off for? ~Jess K. ---------------------------------------------------- - "Does Rudolph fail the safety inspection if his nose is burnt out? And where does he go? I don't think he'd fit in the bay at the Jiffy Lube." Happy holidays, y'all!

I spy possible consideration for an alternate version of: how he adored them enough to cut off his ear but his fame endures Given that VG's fame comes from both his talent as artist and as self-surgeon (I assume sans properly administered anesthesia), a change from but to and might hint in that direction, as in: how he adored them enough to cut off his ear and his fame endures Just here a bit of random thought-speck flitting tween ears like a bat at late dusk making like a weirdly mammalian butterfly against the fullest moon in cloudless sky. Or an exposed single minnow in limpid waters (hard to find/imagine in nature nowadays; i.e., waters pellucid/limpid) darting from the fringes to gain a perhaps claustrophobically comforting companionship amongst his/her school. Of fish, I mean. Yours again, Chuck

is that today, instead of being famous DESPITE the bizarre behavior (cutting off a portion of his ear), he would probably be famous BECAUSE of it. I thought he cut off a portion of his ear to give to a woman. Ronda set you a hard task to fit his complicated life into this form. Maybe: sunflowers, stars and ears, gifts of tortured senses let his fame endure or something to indicate that love creates, destroys and endures. I'm not sure how to write this kind of poetry so sorry I can't be of more help.

This I got immediately. I love it just the way it is We naturally fill in the unsaid with our own words ( depending on which books on VG we have read ) A great write Seabhac