At the ancient pond
a frog plunges into
the sound of water 

Here's mine, again:

          old pond;













  abruptly, the sound 
               of a frog's

              splash-in

Worse, the poem flits slickly by, with no pause, or anything much to suggest quietude, and the breaking of quietude is of central importance here. But the poem is also too slow at its start and treats the pond as less important than it ought to be, for something happens at it, it itself is secondary. The ponderous (in this context) two-syllable word, "ancient," connotes something possibly grand (to little purpose) rather than only something aged, and aging is another archetypal theme the poem ought honor.

The Hamill version has no suspense, either, and suspense heightens any scene.

My version begins with one thing: an old pond. (Note, by the way, the consonance.) Then it stops. There is suspense. Abruptly, after a while, there is a sound--but we don't know what it is. A bit more suspense, in other words. We quickly learn it has to do with a frog, but no more. He hasn't jumped yet. A moment later, the scene is completed with two syllables. There is an explicit splash, and "splash" is a good onomatopoeia, and--as the image here of ephemerality, splashy ephemerality--is more effective explicit than implicit. That it comes at the very end of the poem is effective, too, because the first important comparison the poem makes is quiet, still pond and splash. The splash is scattered water besides being a sound.

A living frog--life--is momentarily between the pond and the splash--and ends inside the pond in my version, not inside a sound. I claim that the image is much more symbolically potent as I have it than as Hamill does. An abruptly appearing frog plunges into a darkness. An old darkness. Because of the aura haiku have (bad word but can't think of a better right now), one tends to find universals in them. In this case, pond as animal existence. Old, large compared to the frog, deep and dark. The frog splashes its surface, breaks its stillness, but will pass like the splash did. But ponds are small and local, and ephermeral compared with oceans, which are ephemeral compared with planets, which are ephemeral compared with the universe. The ripples the poem thus makes should not need further explication. I say they are much more surely generated by my version of the poem than by Hamill's, which I take as more a fresh variation on the poem that those perhaps no longer entranced by a text long familiar to them will be captivated by than an attempt to get the most out of it possible. But, hey, Hamill is a multi-certified American Poet, so I'm no doubt wrong.

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