Crazy Bitches: selected haibun By Roberta Beary (they/she) Artworks by Kevin Beary Published by MacQ 8 March 2025 130 pages

This collection of eighty haibun is a triumph. Those new to haibun are in for a treat, and those experienced with Roberta Beary’s work will gasp and smile with each turned page. Yes, Beary, longtime haibun editor at Modern Haiku, writes brilliant haibun.

And they have famously written about “The Holy Trinity of Haibun”: a title that draws the reader in, prose that is short and engaging, and (one or more) haiku that reflect or expand the prose.* Her haibun are exemplars of this, and they sizzle. And there’s more. Innovative of form, approach, even narrative type, Beary’s haibun effortlessly shift from lyrical to the tightest, bitingly sparse flash. And all this through twenty years of acerbic, ironic, candid, and forceful writing with a voice that’s consistent and unique.

It would have been easy to sequence the haibun in Crazy Bitches from earliest to most recent; and it could have worked. But Beary and publisher/editor Clare MacQueen deserve credit for going further, with two key changes. The first is organizational. The haibun in Crazy Bitches are divided into three Parts representing the periods 2004-2015 (To See in the Dark), 2016-2021 (Send Lazarus), and 2022-2024 (Cheshire Moon). Reversing the order, and placing Cheshire Moon first, immediately exposes readers to Beary’s most recent work. The subsequent Parts, Send Lazarus and To See in the Dark, then go back in time, and show us how Beary’s work has evolved. The second key change is to sequence the haibun within each Part alphabetically by title. This may sound simple, but the effect is to enhance the spontaneousness of the collection. Which also results in some unexpected and splendid juxtapositions, like “Sibling Rivalry Redux” followed by “Somewhat of a Sad Perplexity,” two haibun about Beary’s brother that resonate together through dizzying temporal and emotional shifts.

But to delve into more detail ... The first Part, Cheshire Moon (2022-2024), contains thirty-six published haibun, quite a prolific number. Part I kicks off with the astounding “13 Years” that includes a device that Beary uses frequently—anaphora, the repetition of a sentence-opening word. Here, the repeated “since” drives the prose, while the final haiku is achingly beautiful. Other favorites are “The Art of Communication,” that concludes with this haiku:

snow on bamboo
all the years he tried
to break me

And the extraordinary “When I Read About Janis Ian...” with its stream-of-consciousness prose and a perfect ending haiku.

The haibun in the second Part, Send Lazarus (2016-2021), are noticeably more direct. Most are constructed simply, combining penetrating prose with a final, arresting haiku (though several open with a haiku, and others contain haiku within the prose sections). “Learning to Read” stood out for me; as did “Pompeii” with its striking trio of single-line haiku; and the perfect gem that is “Verisimilitude.” Oh my ...

The third Part, To See in the Dark (2004-2015), contains the earliest work. Yet Beary’s distinctive voice is already fully formed, and the haibun are powerful in their bare simplicity. Here we can see the foundations being laid for what is to follow. And who could not adore “Genetics”—and the incredible “Irish Twins,” for me the star of Beary’s award-winning collection Deflection.

They have long written bravely about difficult subjects, including childhood trauma and relationships. In Part I alone, there are four haibun each about her mother, father, and various exes—photographs bring these themes and times to life. But there are also haibun of joy, and many quirky, fictional tales that maybe, just maybe, could be true. Beary’s devilishly twisted versions of famous fairy tales are delightful, and the ekphrastic haibun, with images to match, reveal an uncanny ability to see what others might never see or imagine.

In summary, Crazy Bitches: selected haibun is a wonderful collection from a superb haibun poet. I highly recommend it.

*Roberta Beary’s essay “Why I Write Haibun, or The Holy Trinity of Haibun” was first published in Blithe Spirit (Vol. 29, No. 3, August 2019), and reprinted in MacQueen’s Quinterly (Issue 1, January 2020):
http://www.macqueensquinterly.com/MacQ1/Beary-Holy-Trinity-Haibun.aspx

Lew Watts

is the author of Tick-Tock, a haibun collection that received an Honorable Mention in the Haiku Society of America’s 2020 Merit Book Awards, and Eira, a collection of haiku that received a 2023 Touchstone Award; both books are from Snapshot Press. Lew is also the co-author, with Roberta Beary and Rich Youmans, of Haibun: A Writer’s Guide (Ad Hoc Fiction, 2023). He is the haibun co-editor of Frogpond and holds an honorary doctorate from Bristol University. Born and raised in Wales, he now lives in Chicago with his wife, Roxanne Decyk. His other passions are fly fishing and gin martinis.