Gogyohka - 五行歌 [An Intro]

Gogyohka (五行歌) is a Japanese form of poetry (spin off the Tanka) created by Enta Kusakebe in the 1960s. For those of you already familiar with Haiku- it is the same idea however there are no syllable counts or content restrictions and there are five lines instead of three. The emphasis is on brevity and the breath. Where one would breath, pause, or an idea breaks-- there you break the line.

Gogyohka was invented partly to solve the problem of international poetry (it is almost impossible to translate English Haiku into Japanese as the syllable ratio is, quite frankly, a nightmare) but it was also meant to open up poetry to a wider audience. With Gogyohka there are no rhymes, no counting syllables, no nature-only edicts, just harmony of thought. Try it. It's heaps of fun. I've been writing it for about a year and a half now and it is a delight to be able to take your ideas and emotions and refine them into a concise thought. I'll be trying to post at least one every Thursday. Enjoy!

To start off, here's one of the first ones I wrote:

bed time

so early

when across the world

people

are still dancing