Haiku is a small poetry with oriental metric that appeared in the XVI century and is being very popular mainly in Japan. It's been disseminating in all around the world during this century. It have an old and long story that reminds the spiritualist philosophy and the Taoist symbolism of the oriental mystics and Zen-Buddhist masters who express much of their thoughts in form of myths, symbols, paradoxes and poetic images like the Haiku. It's done to transcend the limitation imposed by the usual language and the linear/scientific thinking that treat the nature and the human being as a machine.

It's a contemplative poetry that valorizes nature, color, season, contrasts and surprises. Usually it has 3 lines and 17 syllables distributed in 5, 7 and 5. It must register or indicate a moment, sensation, impression or drama of a specific fact of nature. It's almost like a photo of some specific moment of nature.

More than inspiration, it's need meditation, effort and perception to compose a real Haiku.

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Haiku of Kobayashi Issa (1763-1827) left thousands of one-breath masterpieces .

The three most famous Japanese Haiku poets are Basho, Buson, and Issa.

Try to keep your words at a minimum. Lines like "A dark and stormy night" would be considered redundant as 'dark' and 'night' are almost synonymous.

It must be able to capture a specific moment of time. This is much like capturing an image the way photographs do. Just imagine what you want to say in your poem, then focus on it.

Haiku traditionally deal with nature. Trees, flowers, mountains, seas, and the like are the most common subjects. However, some people make use of other everyday things too, like, sports, toys, food, and fashion.

Emotional elements should be included in your haiku. But, you must avoid simply saying how you feel. Lines like: "It's raining and I feel sad" does not give the best impact on your poem. It may be better to write: "There are rain drops in my eyes."

Try to use the present tense. Whenever you use the present tense, you involve your reader with a sense of 'right here, right now,' which makes your poem more effective.

You can allow some flexibility in the 5-7-5 syllable pattern. Since English and Japanese are two different languages, it is generally accepted to try other syllable patterns like 4-6-4 and 3-5-3.