New to Haiku: Advice for Beginners – Tomislav Maretić

Today at New to Haiku, let’s welcome Tomislav Maretić. A member of the Croatian Writers’ Association, Tomislav has been writing haiku for more than 40 years. He has received over 100 merit awards, honorable mentions, and commendations for his poetry. Tomislav has been included in the European Top 100 every year since Polish poet Krzysztof Kokot started this list of most active and creative European haiku poets in 2011. In 2021, Tomislav was honored––along with the co-writers of NEXUS haiku––with the Borivoj Bukva Award from the Croatian Literary Society for the best collection of haiku published that year in Croatia. Thank you for sharing your haiku journey with us, Tomislav!

In Advice for Beginners posts, we ask established haiku poets to share a bit about themselves so that you can meet them and learn more about their writing journeys. We, too, wanted to learn what advice they would give to beginning haiku poets. You can read posts from previous Advice for Beginners interviewees here.

Welcome to New to Haiku, Tomislav! 

Thank you for the invitation, Julie!

You are very welcome. How did you come to learn about haiku?

At the very beginning of everything comes encounter and delight. Then, a spontaneous urge to analyze arises—followed by study, theory, and expert advice. Eventually, we return again to inspiration, that spark of wonder . . . and haiku begins to flow.

In the early days, haiku appeared to me everywhere, like butterflies in a meadow. Only later, when we examine those “caught butterflies” in our drawers, we start to see which ones are truly ready to fly—and which ones are still caterpillars.

It’s hard today to avoid haiku. I don’t believe there is a language anywhere in the world in which it isn’t being written.

My first encounter with haiku was through the collection Leptirova krila (The Butterfly’s Wings, 1964) by the late Dubravko Ivančan. Then came a pivotal work: Japanese Haiku and its Cultural-Historical Context (1970) by mathematician and Japanologist Vladimir Devidé—a book essential to the development of Croatian haiku and beyond.

Interestingly, the first haiku written under that name [as in called a haiku] in Croatia appeared in 1961, by Tonči Petrasov Marović. But only after discovering haiku did I come across a small gem: a collection of tanka poems written by Radovan Ivšić, the surrealist Croatian–French poet and friend of André Breton. His Tanke (1954) contains poems written from 1940 onward. It seems that in Croatia, tanka preceded haiku––by nearly two decades!

I sometimes recall his dreamlike defiance, as in this tanka:

Take all that I have,
but I won’t give you my dreams.
O fragile eyelid,
I refuse to let you lift —
lest waking blur them with tears.
— Radovan Ivšić

Did you have a mentor for haiku? What advice did they give you? Did someone else’s haiku greatly influence your own?

Yes, I had the privilege of being friends with Vladimir Devidé, the renowned mathematician, Japanologist, and academic who strongly championed the haiku form in Croatia. He read some of my early haiku, encouraged me, and offered constructive criticism.

Our relationship was less formal mentorship and more a friendship—a shared exchange of thoughts and inspirations. Devidé had a reputation that commanded attention, and his book Japanese Haiku and Its Cultural-Historical Context was our “bible” in those formative years. It drew deeply from Western and Japanese scholars—R.H. Blyth, D.T. Suzuki, Harold Henderson, Heinrich Dumoulin, Kenneth Yasuda, William Higginson, among others––and helped shape an entire generation of writers.

That spirit of mutual learning was fostered by the Croatian haiku journal Haiku, launched in Varaždin by Zvonko Petrović and Željko Funda from 1977 to 1981. As far as I know, it was the first specialized haiku magazine in Europe, and it became a kind of training ground for aspiring poets across the former Yugoslavia. In that sense, we mentored each other––reading, writing, discussing, and always returning to the essence of haiku: awareness, brevity, and transformation through image.

Where do you write most often? Do you have a writing process?

For me, haiku is a spontaneous poetry—a recognition of something in nature or society that calls to be noticed and recorded. That means I don’t follow a fixed process.

All I need is a pen and a notepad—though I often don’t have either with me! In those cases, I try to remember the core image or feeling, and then develop it later at home. At the beginning, I would discard 80 out of every 100 haiku I wrote. That’s part of the practice.

One helpful approach: jot down impressions in their raw, fragile state. Sometimes the best haiku emerge from what initially seemed unpromising—and sometimes the opposite happens. After a poem has “rested” a while, I return to it with fresh eyes and realize that something I was initially fascinated by no longer holds the same weight, while a seemingly minor detail reveals unexpected depth.

To me, it’s all a kind of joyful play—and without that, none of this would make sense.

How do you approach reading haiku?

I don’t follow any special method. A haiku collection can—but doesn’t have to—be read from beginning to end. Haiku allows for a slow, intuitive kind of reading: you flip through the pages, and suddenly one poem shines.

Other poems, which may be just as excellent, sometimes need a bit more attention or stillness. That’s why revisiting a collection is important; haiku can unfold over time.

As R.H. Blyth said, “We do not read a haiku; we become it.”

What advice would you give to someone who is just starting out?

I sometimes feel that everyone starting out in haiku is already, unknowingly, an experienced haiku poet. Why? Because we all share the same foundation: childhood encounters with nature that are impossible to forget or ignore:

• a chirping cricket that falls silent when you approach,
• the vastness of the stars while swimming at night,
• the surprise of blossoming trees,
• the joy of skipping stones,
• bending down to sniff violets . . .

These millions of small moments exist in us all. Haiku is the lamp that illuminates them.

Haiku returns us to our own lived experience and invites us to touch it. But it never explains—only suggests. The reader finishes the poem in their own mind. That’s part of haiku’s magic.

I believe this is what captivated the West about haiku: a poetry that simply transcribes nature as it is, something Western literature had rarely attempted with such restraint. R.H. Blyth famously said, “Haiku is not a poem, it is a way of life.” Alan Watts called it “a poem without words.”

Later, haiku evolved into an imaginative art as well. With gendai and avant-garde styles—graphic, abstract, metaphorical—some might say it resembles Western poetry in a small form. But good haiku, even outside traditional rules, can still be recognized. That shift began in Japan in the 1930s with poets like Yamaguchi Seishi and Hino Sōjō, and it gained strength globally in the late 20th and early 21st centuries.

A well-known poet once joked with me that haiku feels like walking in shoes too tight––it gives you blisters! At first, I might have agreed. But now, I see haiku’s compactness not as a constraint, but as a precision of beauty, constantly reinventing itself.

So my advice?

Read, and keep reading. Explore both respected journals and lesser-known ones.

Find your own path. Because in haiku, each poet writes from the center of their own attention.

What are some fun ways that you have used or experienced haiku?

Others around me have found delightfully creative ways to bring haiku into life.

In Croatia, Željko Funda and academic painter Mihael Štebih once launched a project where they placed handwritten haiku, with names and phone numbers, into small bottles and released them into the Bednja River. Some bottles were found downstream, and the finders called back. There were amusing stories!

Štebih also created a striking art exhibition of abstract glass sculptures inspired by haiku. His luminous forms captured something of haiku’s fragility and clarity.

Through haiku, I have also gained friendships. Sometimes it’s about exchanging thoughts and collaboration, sometimes about meeting in real life and making plans and creating results together. And sometimes a real friendship lasts for decades, even though we’ve never met in person or heard each other’s voices.

Do you have a favorite haiku that you have written? Can you share the story behind one of them?

It’s difficult to choose a single favorite. Each of my haiku brings back a memory of the moment it was born. Here are a few I have on hand:

Dylan concert –
wilted flower children
young again

mountain path –
a wood grouse in love
won’t let us pass

hazy moon –
a nightingale in the canyon
competes with its echo

I forgot
the magnolia tree
until it bloomed

open windows –
under the sheets, we listen
to the summer rain

security camera –
our secret kiss caught
at the grocery store

bay at night –
sounds of dishwashing
from a yacht

I light the candle
on her grave again –
autumn wind

But one of my haiku stands apart for me, not necessarily in form, but in its backstory.

I worked as an infectious disease specialist at the Dr. Fran Mihaljević Clinic in Zagreb, treating immunocompromised patients, including those living with HIV. Before effective therapy, their prognosis was often grim and social stigma was strong.

The cardinal visited our ward several times. He came not to preach, but to honor their suffering—to sit and talk, regardless of their beliefs. His visits brought visible joy.

Before one visit, I noticed the cherry blossoms outside the hospital had fallen across the pathway. A janitor was instructed to sweep them up. As I watched this quiet erasure of beauty, this haiku came to me:

company’s coming –
should the petals be swept
off the paths?

What haiku-related project are you currently working on that brings you joy? What do you like about it?

Since 2018 I’ve been translating poems and prose by Canadian haiku master Michael Dudley, who has visited Croatia three times and meaningfully contributed to numerous literary events. Earlier this year I assembled and edited a manuscript that features Michael’s translated haiku and essays as well as artworks by the accomplished Croatian painter Natalia Borčić Peuc. The book is currently being prepared for publication later this year.

In 2021, Michael, Dejan Pavlinović, and I published NEXUS haiku, a bilingual collection of cross-cultural, co-created haiku, senryu, sequences, and rengay. Each poem in the volume was composed collaboratively by either two or three of us. Michael suggested that the three of us co-write [poetry] together as well as the book title. Working together on the project, in person and via technology, was richly rewarding, both personally and artistically.

This year, thanks primarily to the efforts of writer Nikola Đuretić, the international Vladimir Devidé Haiku Award has been revived in Zagreb, the birthplace of Vladimir Devidé, after a seven-year hiatus. The award was originally established in Japan in 2011 by the former Croatian ambassador to that country, Dr. Drago Štambuk.

Currently, I am writing literary reviews of several excellent haiku collections by Nikola Đuretić, Dejan Pavlinović, Goran Gatalica, Nina Kovačić, Nada Jačmenica, Boris Vrga, Nada Zidar Bogadi, and Ante Mate Ivandić. It’s a joy and an honor to engage deeply with such fine work––and to be part of a living haiku culture that continues to grow. Reviewing these works is like visiting multiple poetic gardens.

I almost forgot that I have been preparing my own collection, because since 2014 — in the eleven years since my last haiku book (Sky in the Backwaters) appeared — I have gathered enough poems from periodicals and elsewhere for a more substantial volume.

You’ve been named one of the 100 most creative haiku poets in Europe (2011–2024). Congratulations! What are some of your most unique poems? What do you like about them?

Thank you! To be honest, I’ve often thought I would stop writing haiku—and at times, I did. But haiku would always find me again.

That recognition perhaps reflects consistency in writing, translation, and community work. I wouldn’t call my poems unique––that feels like too heavy a word––but I’m glad to share some that feel alive to me:

rainy day –
only one umbrella stops
by the forsythia

lightning in the night –
for a moment all the islands
come into view

a late visit –
water lilies
already closed

for sale –
an empty cobweb
in the autumn wind

hey, snail —
at my age
we’d reach the hilltop together!

season’s change –
floral dresses stroll
down the street

Each of these came from a moment of quiet noticing. That’s what I like most about haiku—not what I say, but what the poem helps reveal.

Can you describe the haiku community in Croatia? How would a new haiku poet get involved?

Croatia once had two haiku associations, but both are now inactive. Today, we stay connected through haiku.hr and several annual gatherings: the Samobor Haiku Meeting, the Ludbreg Haiku Meeting, and (until recently) the Bučijada in Ivanić-Grad.

Personal contact works best. That’s how Michael Dudley found us!

The Samobor Haiku Meeting, founded by Darko Plažanin in 1993, is now the oldest continuous haiku event in Croatia. His haiku that gained international attention:

after the storm
a boy wiping the sky
from the tables
— Darko Plažanin

The spirit of the Samobor gathering is not competitive; it’s a meeting of poets, a time to share, connect, and celebrate haiku. That spirit has kept it alive for over 30 years!

Ivanić-Grad was home to the journal Iris (2008–2023), edited by Đurđa Vukelić-Rožić, who published two major anthologies: An Unmown Sky (vol 1: 1996–2007 and vol 2: 2008–2018). These followed Devidé’s 1996 national anthology. In 2023, a new anthology appeared: Contemporary Croatian Haiku, co-edited by Nikola Đuretić and myself. It brings together the newest voices, affirming that haiku in Croatia continues to evolve.

What advice do you have for poets who want to translate haiku into other languages?

To translate haiku well, one must begin with a clear understanding of the poem. Beyond language skills, it helps to speak directly with the author or request a fuller explanation of the context. Without that, we may misread the scene entirely.

Haiku is a form of human communication, and it must be clear, direct, and evocative. Anyone who writes haiku understands that it begins in attention, empathy, and connection—and so does its translation.

Thank you for the invitation [to New to Haiku: Advice for Beginners]––it’s been an honor to share my thoughts.

You are very welcome, Tomaslav! It is a pleasure to have you here. :)

Tomislav Maretić (Zagreb, 1951) is a Croatian poet and infectious disease specialist. He lives in Zagreb and, for the past seven years, has continued his medical work at the hospital in Čakovec, in northern Croatia. His professional focus has been on HIV/AIDS and Lyme borreliosis.

Writing poetry for over four decades, he is best known for his haiku, through which he has gained recognition both in Croatia and internationally. He also writes free verse. Maretić has received more than one hundred awards in national and international competitions, and his haiku have appeared in over fifty anthologies, almanacs, and collections worldwide, as well as in numerous periodicals. His free verse poetry has likewise been included in several Croatian anthologies.

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