Ah, another good question.  Reading some recently posted poems and the comments to those poems and considering several past discussions I have had on the subject, I found there is a good deal of confusion about the differences between haiku and senryu.  My earlier article titled
What is Haiku
discussed haiku in some detail.  In this article, I will provide some explanation of senryu.
Much like I did for my haiku article, I pulled out my "Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary" and looked up the definition of senryu, but I found nothing there.  Unlike haiku, where Mr. Webster misled us with a poor definition, he is silent on senryu.  That's a good sign, at least I won't have to fight Mr. Webster on this one and you won't have to set any small fires in your house as you burn the pages with the misleading definitions.
from my book
not another page
a small fire
I remember an email conversation from some time ago when someone asked me: "What is the "exact" difference between haiku and senryu?  I had to think a while on this, because while I had read and written both haiku and senryu, I had not spent much time considering the precise difference between the two.  My most succinct answer to the question took two emails and quotes from three highly qualified sources.  The quotes offered three very different definitions.
In 1970, the Haiku Society of America's Definitions Committee quoted in
The Haiku Handbook
by William J. Higgenson, defined senryu as:
"Loosely, a poem similar to haiku which does not meet the criteria for haiku."
Ouch!  Higgenson, who chose to include the above definition in his book, went on to say:
"Although I was a member of that committee, I do not like suggesting that a senryu is a failed haiku."
Higgenson realized that, while some senryu result from failed haiku, often the poet will set out to write a senryu.  He explains:
"...a senryu relies on a point of wit instead of provocation by contrast, as does the haiku."
While the guests order
the table cloth hides his hands  --
counting his money
(Clement Hoyt - from "The Haiku Handbook")
In his book, Higgenson offered a description for senryu that was very different from the Haiku Society of America's:
"A humorous or satiric poem dealing with human affairs, usually written in the same form as haiku."
While this definition more closely matches my understanding of senryu, I think Cor Van den Heuvel in his
The haiku Anthology
provided the best definition of senryu.  He described the difference between haiku and senryu as:
"Senryu is the same as haiku except, instead of dealing with Nature, it is specifically about human nature and human relationships and is often humorous."
Library closing --
the sleeping wino wakes up
holding a shut book
