Brueggemann, James G.

James G. Brueggemann

Born: Austin, Texas USA (1942)
Current: Mount Pleasant, South Carolina USA
Born into a Wisconsin pastor’s family, he became a physician, practicing in Duluth, Minnesota for 26 years. His haiku, personal essays and poetry have been published in literary and medical journals since 1979. After the Night Rain, a haiku collection, was published in 2014. He blogs weekly since 2018.
Blog: http://www.jamesbrueggemann.com

Primorac, Vera

Vera Primorac (1942 ̶ 2022)

Biography

Vera Primorac graduated from grammar school and the School for teachers in the town of her native town Mostar (Bosnia and Herzegovina) and graduated in the Croatian language and literature from the Pedagogical Academy. Most of her teaching years she worked at the Grammar School “Braća Šimić” in Mostar. She worked as a teacher in France as well, where she continued to write and paint on silk. She had a number of joint and independent exhibitions in France, Croatia, and Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Vera Primorac wrote poetry from her early childhood, publishing it in a number of literary journals, both in print and digital. For decades she published prose: aphorisms, columns, short stories, reviews and essays. She published ten books, her lyrics being translated into several languages. She edited twenty books of prose and poetry. For her haiku she received over twenty top international and domestic awards. Chosen by Krzysztof Kokot (Poland), she was on the list of the European Top 100 Haiku Authors in 2010 ̶ 2011. She was on the editorial staff of the Anthology of the Croatian Haiku Poetry, An Unmown Sky (1996 ̶ 2007). She was a member of several literary and haiku associations and as a member of Matrix Croatica, the Viškovo Branch, she was awarded the Plaque of the Municipal Viškovo, for her literary attainments and promotion of Croatia in 2009.

Awards and Other Honors:

Haiku sequence Award, Kloštar Ivanić Haiku Contest (2007); Award, A Little Haiku Contest by IRIS haiku magazine no 3/4, (Ivanić Grad, Croatia); Selected haiku (by Kōko Katō), Basho Festival Haiku Contest (2009); Two second prizes, The 13th International Kusamakura Haiku Competition (2008); Comendation, Apokalipsa haiku magazine contest (Slovenija, 2005); World Haiku 2010 No.6, World Haiku Association; Third Prize, International Kusamakura Haiku Competition (2006); First Prize, Kloštar Ivanić Haiku Contest, Croatia language category (2008); Second Prize for haiku sequence, Kloštar Ivanić Haiku Contest (2010); named one of the top 100 European haiku poets by haiku.forum.pl.; work included on the Haiku Society of America's "Haiku Wall" at the Liberty Theatre Gallery in Bend, Oregon (June 3-5, 2011); Honorable Mention, Vancouver Cherry Blossom Festival Award (2011)); Honorable Mention, Haiku Contest of the Journal of Romanian-Japanese cultural interferences HAIKU (2012).

Books published - Japanese short poems:

Utočišta, Društvo haiku pjesnika Rijeka, 2006;
Tragovi, Društvo haiku pjesnika Rijeka, 2007;
Miris zemlje.Matica hrvatska ogranak Viškovo, Viškovo, 2008;
Dvije obale/dva kraja, hrvatski jezik i čakavsko narječje, Viškovo, 2013.

Selection of haiku:

spring adorned
by crimson sour-cherries
behind both ears

rumenom višnjom
proljeće se okiti
iza oba uha

(Third Prize, International “Kusamakura” Haiku Competition, Japan 2006)

*

from an old photo album
smiling at me tenderly
childhood

iz starog fotoalbuma
nježno mi se smiješi
sjetinjstvo

(Two Second Prizes, The 13^th International “Kusamakura” Haiku Competition, Japan 2008)

*

with drops
of rain
a rain of petals

s kapljicama
kiše
kiša latica

(Special Merit Award, The 20^th Itoen “Oh-I-Ocha” New Haiku Contest, Japan 2012)

*

a ruined house
knitted all around
in the cobwebs

razrušena kuća
premrežena unaokolo
paučinom

(Commended work, The 42^nd A-Bomb Memorial Day Haiku Contest, Japan 2008)

*

autumn evening
rain poured music
into the gutters

jesenja večer,
kiša ulila glazbu
u oluke

(Ploc la revie du haiku No. 31, France 2012)

Sources:
https://thehaikufoundation.org/poet-details/?IDclient=138
https://akitahaiku.com/2011/11/12/3-11-haiku-from-vera-primorac-croatia/
http://www.worldhaiku.net/poetry/si/vera_primorac/1st.html

Tico, Tom

Tom Tico

May 15, 1942 - February 4, 2016
Tom Tico's Legacy Biography

Tico, Tom

Tom Tico

(15 May 1942 – 4 February 2016)

Thomas Michael Tico was born on 15 May 1942 in San Francisco, California and he lived nearly all his life in the city he loved. Tom Tico’s first haiku appeared in American Haiku in 1966. And since then his poems have been steadily published in various haiku magazines and in a number of anthologies: Cor van den Heuvel’s “The Haiku Anthology”, Bruce Ross’s “Haiku Moment”, and the “San Francisco Haiku Anthology”. Tom also had numerous essays published, mainly in Frogpond, Modern Haiku and other haiku journals. In 1989 Tom Tico was a co-judge to the “1989 Gerald Brady Senryu Awards”. In 1992, he co-edited The San Francisco Haiku Anthology (Smythe-Waithe Press, 1992).

Committed to living an artistic life, Tom Tico dedicated his life to his passion as a haiku poet. In the early 70's, he determined conventional employment was no longer for him. He resigned from his work with the US Postal Service, and dedicated his time and energy for the remainder of his life to creative and personally satisfying pursuits. While his commitment to this path was not without challenges, Tom never wavered from his absolute certainty that he was living his life the way he needed to in order to be true to himself.

In 1998 Tom self-published a book "Spring Morning Sun". In the ‘Introduction’ to the book he wrote: “From 1985 through 1995 I spent over seven years in a state of homelessness, sleeping in a redwood forest in Golden Gate Park.” His experience from those years shaped his haiku significantly. Tom’s life just comes through in his haiku:

At the soup kitchen,
a faded reproduction
of The Last Supper

In my sleeping bag
in a fetal position;
this cold autumn night

Later in his life, Tom developed a passion for photography, and applied the same lens evident in many of his haiku - the beauty of the marriage between the natural and the urban environment.

Tom loved to walk, which gave him the opportunity to find inspiration for his haiku or his photography. Movies and books were two of Tom's other life-long enjoyments. He had an extraordinary knowledge of movies, directors, actors and authors.

Tom Tico passed away peacefully on 4 February 2016 due to a degenerative lung disease. On the last night of his life, he reflected with contentment on his life "as an outsider", the significance of being able to take satisfaction in the character of his children, and his readiness for whatever came next. Tom is survived by his brother, Edward Tico; children: Christopher, Alexander, Minerva and Nathanael Tico; daughters-in-law: Wendy, Kristin and Rebecca; and grandchildren: Jonathan, Alex, Jordan, Morgan, Reeva, Adrian, Gabriella, and Sawyer.

Some publications:

Tico, Tom. “Personification” [workshop]. Frogpond 21.1 (1998);
Tico, Tom. “The Imaginative Haiku: Readings by Tom Tico” [workshop]. Frogpond 20.1 (1999);
Tico, Tom. “Affinities: Thoreau and the Japanese Haiku Poets” [workshop]. Frogpond 22.3 (1999);
Tico, Tom. “Like a Fine Wine” [workshop]. Frogpond 22.2 (1999);
Tico, Tom. “The Dark Side of Kali” [workshop]. Frogpond 22.1 (1999);
Tico, Tom. “The Music of Haiku” [workshop]. Frogpond 24.2 (2001);
Tico, Tom. “The Sad, Lonely Poetry of the City” [workshop]. Frogpond 20.3 (12/1/1997);
Tico, Tom. “Endlessness in a Small Frame: Readings” [workshop]. Frogpond 18.2 (summer 1995);
Tico, Tom. “A Handful of Shadows, Readings” [workshop]. Frogpond 18.4 (winter 1995);
Tico, Tom. “Tassajara Zen Center” [sequence [5]]. Modern Haiku 10:1 (Winter–Spring 1979);
Tico, Tom. “A Reading of Marjory Bates Pratt” [workshop]. Modern Haiku 13:1 (Winter–Spring 1982);
Tico, Tom. “Scarecrow Reading” [workshop]. Modern Haiku 13:2 (Summer 1982);
Tico, Tom. “The Sun the Moon and the Stars: A Reading of Foster Jewell” [workshop]. Modern Haiku 14:2 (Summer 1983);
Tico, Tom. “The Peach-Blossom Spring [O Southard]” [workshop]. Modern Haiku 14:3 (Fall 1983);
Tico, Tom. “River and Mountain: A Reading of Larry Gates” [workshop [10]]. Modern Haiku 15:1 (Winter- Spring 1984);
Tom Tico, "The Spice of Life", Frogpond 30:1 (winter 2007).

In anthologies:

Cor van den Heuvel, editor. The Haiku Anthology: English Language Haiku by Contemporary American and Canadian Poets (1974).
Cor van den Heuvel, editor. The Haiku Anthology: Haiku and Senryu in English (revised [2nd] edition, 1986), and (expanded [3rd] edition, 1999).
Bruce Ross, ed., Haiku Moment (1993)

Selected haiku:

autumn evening . . .
a page of the old book
separates from the spine

(Honorable Mention: 1999 Harold G. Henderson Memorial Award)

*
First days of summer . . .
already the leaves gather
beneath the sycamores

(Honorable Mention: 1990 Harold G. Henderson Memorial Award)

*

A wisp of spring cloud
drifting apart from the rest. . . .
slowly evaporates.

(“The Haiku Anthology Revised Edition”, Simon and Schuster, 1986, pg. 242)

*

old plum trees:
how quickly the one dies
after the other

(Modern Haiku 38:3, autumn 2007)

*

at the burial
one of the black umbrellas
breaks down

(Modern Haiku 41:3, autumn 2010)

*

in this little part
of the solar system
dust motes

(Frogpond 37:3, Autumn 2014)

*

Sandpipers
running along the glassy beach
on top of themselves

a windless morning
and still the plum blossoms
flutter to the ground

Dusk …
the whole forest dark
except for the lilies

Engulfing
the purple rhododendrons
shadows of evening

a morning fog:
again and again the caw
of an unseen crow

On every step
of the old stone stairway –
autumn leaves

(Haiku Moment: An Anthology of Contemporary North American Haiku, Tuttle Publishing, 1993) edited by Bruce Ross

*

As day breaks...
the lightness of her breath
on my back

(“The Haiku Anthology”, ed. by Cor van den Heuvel, Norton 1999, pg.222)

*

Sitting in the sun
in the middle of the plants
that I just watered

(Woodnotes 25, 1995)

*

Beside the tenement
a box of broken glass
filled with autumn sun

Mud-puddle water
going this way and that--
spring wind

After gazing at stars . . .
now, I adjust to the rocks
under my sleeping bag

Nothing to bring her . . .
except flowers from the gardens
all along the way

Shortening the line
at the soup kitchen--
the first fall rain

The old carving tree . . .
a new pair of initials
and the first young leaves

The white butterfly
just the touch of my shadow
and it flies away

("Spring Morning Sun" (1998)

*

Misting across
the cold bright stars -
my own breath

(Published in San Francisco Chronicle on Feb. 28, 2016)

This profile was created with the kind help of Charles Trumbull, Peggy Mather, John Stevenson and Michael Dylan Welch.

And this is Tom’s tribute written by his children at the San Francisco Chronicle, Feb. 28, 2016:

http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/sfgate/obituary.aspx?n=thomas-tico&pid=177872280

Sources:

foghorns…
the vague shapes
of familiar trees

beneath purple leaves
the unpicked fruit
stains the sidewalk

after a long stretch of stargazing first light

around the corner
from the swank nursing home
one for the poor

Valentine’s Day:
my heart favors
the plum blossoms

in this little part
of the solar system
dust motes

loosening
the hard and fast lines
fog

following the lead my elongated shadow

cold park:
so many trees
skeletonized

emphysema --
it could be the name
of an exotic femme fatale
who ends up leaving you
breathless

Easter morning
rising later
than usual

angels’ trumpets
yet here and there
a bit of rust

insomnia…
getting to know
the night

the chiaroscuro of crows and morning mist

intermittent rain the long and the short of it

making the most
of the broken-down fence
nasturtiums

in the world
but not of it --
autumn wind

just another
of winter’s losses --
my singing voice

every bit as black
as the plumage of the crows --
their strident cries