Alan Spence has been publishing haiku for more than 50 years (alongside his novels, plays and short stories). Commenting on his poetry, Lucien Stryk, co-editor of the Penguin Book of Zen Poetry, wrote that it was ‘remarkably close in spirit and execution to the best of the works of the great four of haiku, Basho, Buson, Issa and Shiki,’ adding that it was work that would last. Now Spence adds to his output with this new sequence of haiku and tanka. As in his previous collections, the poems trace the cycle of seasons through a year (or a life). There is an ever-deepening sense of mono no aware, the ‘touchingness of things,’ the beauty of the fleeting, the transient, moment by moment, now poignant, now with an understated humour, a clarity and freshness of observation.

the particular silence

that falls

with the snow

Spence is a calm and necessary visionary, all openness of instinct and imagination. – Ali Smith

September 2026. 80 pages. 8.5 x 5.5 in / 140 x 216 mm. ISBN 978-4-907359-57-7 (paperback).

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