Paradigm

Ruth F. Harrison of Waldport, Oregon, wrote me on May 26th, 2007, to say, among much else, “One other thing I went into mental discussion with you on, was the matter of the haiku ending “Paradigm” in The Book of Forms [Third Edition], but not in its predecessor The New Book of Forms [the second edition of The Book of Forms]. I visited the poem recently in writing yet another paradigm, and found the haiku, and thought I’d overlooked it and repeated the mistake to other poets, all that while since I had tried to emulate your poem and make a form of it. I’d like to correct what I’ve done and add the haiku, though some poems finish well on the tanka and don’t need it. I liked your poem very well as it stood in the earlier edition.

“My sister, in a recent visit here, asked me, ‘What would you do in judging a contest if someone tried the form and left the haiku off? Would that disqualify it?’ Having seen some paradigms in judging a contest’s traditional forms section, I had to answer, ‘The poem would have to stand on its own merits, unless the contest originators stated specific forms requirements’…but I will need to send something to Poets’ Forum for its next issue to open the matter for discussion, since its readers are the people most likely to love the poem and hope to emulate your beautiful work.”

On May 31st I replied, “As to ‘Paradigm’: It was not meant to be a form on its own, but only an example of the various Japanese forms in chronological order; however, you’re not the first to decide to make it a form. (This has happened to several of my ‘example’ poems.) Until you mentioned it, I was unaware there was a difference between the examples in The New Book and TBoF3. I just looked them up, and the former is a printing error that dropped the final stanza (though you’re right, it ends just fine either way). Because the haiku was the final development in the string of Japanese forms, it properly ought to end the poem. I have no idea how I happened to miss it until now. Thank you greatly for pointing it out to me.”

Since there are many people who are still using The New Book of Forms, perhaps they would like to see the poem as it ought to have appeared in that book, so this is the version as it appears in TBoF3 (2000). Poetry: An Intro-duction Through Writing (1973), and in Fearful Plea-sures: The Com-plete Poems 1959-2007, p. 247
(q.v.):

Listen to Lewis Turco read his poem

Download Paradigm

Why does the brook run?
The banks of the stream are green.

Why does the stream run?
The banks of the brook bloom
with roe and cup-moss, with rue.

The trees are filled with
cups. Grain in the fields, straw men
talking with the wind.
Have you come far, water-
borne, wind-born? Here are
hounds-tongue and mistletoe oak.

When the spears bend as
you walk through vervain or broom,
call out to the brook —
it will swell in your veins as
you move through broom or vervain.

Have you spoken aloud? Here,
where the swallows' crewel-work
sews the sky with mist?
You must cut the filament.
You must be the lone spider.

The bole is simple:
Twig and root like twin webs in
air and earth like fire.

Actually, since each of the “stanzas” of this example illustrates a whole Japanese form, each is a “poem” on its own, and one might stop the poem after any of the forms and still have the series end satisfactorily, which explains why stopping it after the tanka seemed to do “Paradigm” no harm.

From Poets' Forum Magazine, Vol. 19, #3, Winter 2008:

Ruth Harrison's Challenge: Here's a challenge Forum poets might enjoy. It isn't mine, alas: I just found it when I was browsing about among forms with my hair standing up, the way one does with Turco, and came upon his poem "Paradigm" under, of all headings, Forensics. His poem links several Japanese forms, mostly structured on questions and their INTUITIVE answers. His syllable-count is strict; I followed the order and structure of his sample poem in my attempt:

Jean at the Window
— a reflection

after Lewis Turco, "Paradigm"

How does the rainfall?
Her soul is a yellow cup.

Where does water end?
Her soul accepts coffee, alms or a rose,
rosemary, rain.

Should the rain stop, it changes the music,
the song leaves empty questions.
How shall she know, stone-bearer,
light-weaver, maker — ?
what will answer this silence?

A cup is empty,
a drink of shadows, hollow.
Full, it is hyssop.
sage, mallows, lavender, thyme;
water breathing of gardens.

What is this watching?
How shall a word break silence
after a rainfall?
She twirls a brown maple leave
brittle and dry, old parchment.

Ruth F. Harrison, copyright; all rights reserved.

Ruth had the name and syllable count next to each of her stanzas, but I wanted readers to read "Jean at the Window" first as a poem, and then to read it again to see the structure.

The book she is referring to is The New Book of Forms by Lewis Turco (University Press of New England, 1986, [pp. 154-156]. She suggests "anyone trying a Turco Paradigm will want to look up each form under its separate entry (in The New Book of Forms or The Book of Forms, Third Edition, 2000, pp.) for fuller information." This is always a good suggestion and one of the reasons why PFM lists sources with publisher and copyright date.

In Turco's Poetry: An Introduction Through Writing (Reston Publishing Co., 1973), chapter 12, "Of Imagery, he also gives definitions of some of those forms, and [the] poem "Para-digm," stat-ing it "il-lustrates some of the Japanese syllabic forms at the same time that it parallels the development of the of the forms as they led up to the haiku."

In the summer of 2007 Ruth Harrison wrote PFM,"There's a discrepancy between the version of Lewis Turco's poem 'Paradigm' as it appears in The New Book of Forms and The Book of Forms, Third Edition. In the latter edition he has added a haiku to the end of the poem, to make it a complete paradigm for the traditional Japanese forms. I submitted my challenge poems to PFM a few years ago, before the Third Edition had come out, so used the older verseion as my model. [Nota bene: the version of 'Paradigm' in Poetry: An Introduction, 1973, which Ruth Harrison had evidently not seen, contains the final haiku — L. T.] Since the paradigm has become a form in itself, and people are submitting paradigms in the category of traditional forms in contests, a dilemma arises: to include or not to include the terminal haiku. For my part, I'd as soon add it, and it might be good practice for poets who have tried the "form" as I presented it to revise their poems accordingly. If the addition adds something to the poem and does no damage or weakening. What do you think?"

Madelyn Eastlund, editor of PFM, replied: "It sounds like it would be a good 'revisit' to the previous article with a revision after — and I don't think the paradigm qualifies as a 'traditional' poem, do you? I have noticed lately thatmore modern forms are being put in traditional poem contests. I think we need to look at the definition of 'traditional' in regard to contest categories. I really would like an update from you on this form — and if you have been in communication with Lewis Turco on this, perhaps some quote from him on the reason he revised the form."

Another Look at "Paradigm" — 2007 update by Ruth F. Harrison: "I was revisiting Lewis Turco's The Book of Forms one morning in summer to have another look at his singular and lovely poem 'Paradigm' and perhaps to attempt another poem of that kind, if everything chimed. Imagine my surprise when I found a difference, nothuge, but dramatic, between this and the poem I remembered and had been imitating with varying success at intervals over the past few years. I gulped because I had introduced the poem-as-form to PFM members in an arrangement I now saw was erroneous, but felt I must face up to my error and I immediately wrote to Madelyn and also dropped a note to Lewis Turco to ask about the difference.

Lewis Turco's generous reply came immediately: [See paragraph three in the main body of this entry, above].

I must add that I had wondered, early in my study of this poem, at the omission of the haiku, and had decided that it, as the most familiar of Japanese forms to the western reader, probably went without saying. But it seems to me that we who have tried our own paradigms as form are now faced with thequestion of the haiku, and I have gone back to some of my paradigms to see whether, and how, a haiku might become them, or finish them in any apt way. Readers who have tried the earlier version of this form [?] may also want to do this.

One final note — this grouping of forms we have been naming paradigm in honor of Turco's breathtaking poem, is not in any sense a traditional form. It is rather his poem's title: a poem in which he demonstrates the development of Japanese traditional forms.

Editor of PFM: Those readers who answered Ruth's 1998 challenge might want to decide whether to leave those poems as written or revise by adding a haiku at the end. PFM would like to hear about your decision.

“Paradigm” appeared originally in Poetry: An Introduction through Writing, by Lewis Turco, Reston: Reston Publishing, 1973. ISBN 0879096373, paper; out-of-print, but available from ERIC (Educational Resources Information Center) of the Institute of Education Sciences (IES) of the U. S. Department of Education. It was first collected in Seasons of the Blood: Poems on the Tarot by Lewis Turco, Rochester: Mammoth Press, 1980, out-of-print, but all the poems in the series are collected in Fearful Pleasures: The Complete Poems of Lewis Turco 1959-2007, www.StarCloudPress.com, 2007, ISBN 978-1-932842-19-5, jacketed cloth, $49.95; ISBN 978-1-932842-20-3, trade paperback, $32.95, 640 pages. ORDER FROM AMAZON.COM. “Paradigm” may also be found in The Book of Forms: A Handbook of Poetics by Lewis Turco, Third edition, www.UPNE.com, 2000. ISBN 1584650222, trade paperback, $24.95, 337 pages. “The Poet’s Bible," A companion volume to The Book of Dialogue and The Book of Literary Terms. ORDER FROM AMAZON.