The Virgil Hutton Memorial Chapbook Awards 1998-1999

Haiku collections by Randy Brooks of Decatur, Illinois; Garry Gay of Santa Rosa, California; Robert Gilliand of Austin, Texas; and Ruth Yarrow of Seattle, Washington, captured the four winning chapbooks in the Virgil Hutton Haiku Memorial Award Chapbook Contest for 1998-1999.

A celebration of haiku, as well as a fitting memorial tribute to the late haiku poet, Virgil Hutton, this contest is sponsored by the Hutton family and Saki Press, Normal, Illinois. This first annual haiku chapbook contest had entries from the US, Canada, England, New Zealand, and Australia.

Saki Press

Please note that these chapbooks are not available for sale from Brooks Books.

THE HOMESTEAD CEDARS
by Randy Brooks

Saki Press Chapbook
ISBN 1-893823-03-2

Brooks is a professor of English at Millikin University in Decatur, Illinois, and the publisher of Brooks Books. This is a collection of haiku and senyru integrating the family of past times with the family at present-strong images connecting to the past as one's ancestors continue to live on in present generations through memories, heirlooms, values, and a sense of continuity.

               her open Bible . . .
               a page smudged long ago
               by a coal miner's thumb

"A miniaturized novel suggesting native-soil saga of a long-established family " —W.H. Hutton

Gay is a professional California-based photographer and writer of haiku who created the poetic form called "Rengay," This is a solid and tight selection of Garry Gay's favorite work that showcases his style and "haiku vision." He has skillfully incorporated a certain flow into the work, yet allowed it breathing room, which heightens the subtleness of his discovery.

               Hole in the clouds
               just the right size
               for this full moon

"Illustrates in a striking and dramatic way the parallel coalescence of mathematics and poetry." —W.H. Hutton

RIVER STONES
haiku by Garry Gay

Saki Press Chapbook
ISBN 1-893823-01-6

mosquitoes and moonlight
by Robert Gilliland

Saki Press Chapbook
ISBN 1-893823-02-4

Gilliland is a medical doctor with psychiatric specialization, and a former photographer turned haiku poet. He provides cogent contrasts between sound and silence--sometimes with the silences of the past providing accentuation to the sounds of the present--which generate significant overtones of the etherial, almost spiritual, circumstances of the haiku moment.

               rusty screen door-
               letting in mosquitoes
               and moonlight

"An imagistic moment of intuitive realization conveying a sense of nature's sometimes pesky, invading noise contrasted with eternal, silent beauty." —Lenore Hutton

Yarrow is a former teacher of the natural environment in colleges and nature centers throughout the Northeast (and currently an active environmentalist in the Pacific Northwest). She presents a collected kaleidoscopic mosaic of earth's seasons interacting with various serendipitous moments that reflect contrasts around specific edges: edges of light, form, change, awareness, and survival.

               desert morning
               on the anthill pink crystals
               from a deeper layer

"An intricately dainty, yet profound, image—a microcosm of the ongoing enlightening activities of the world and the universe…" --W.H. Hutton

SUN GILDS THE EDGE
by Ruth Yarrow

Saki Press Chapbook
ISBN1-893823-04-0

JOGGING THE HAIKU HIGHWAY
by Virgil Hutton

Saki Press Chapbook
ISBN 1-893823-05-9

A new collection of 50 haiku and senyru by the late haiku poet, Virgil Hutton about life and death, light and dark, season in and out,from the runner's keen eye and soles as he perseveres on his ever-changing path . . .

               The old jogger--
               even his shadow
               dragging its feet

"The two basics that I strive for in haiku writing are simplicity and profundity. . . One's poems ideally should leave one with a sense of yet undiscovered meanings and nuances."—Virgil Hutton

If you would like your book or magazine or web site featuring haiku to be featured at this web site, send a review copy or contact information to: Brooks Books, 6 Madera Court, Taylorville, IL 62568