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Gloria H. Procsal (born Gloria Hope Fulmer, November 19, 1925, Kansas (probably Fremont, Lyon county), U.S.A., died December 17, 2014, Oceanside, California). Actively published in the top English language haiku journals in the U.S.A. and Japan, including Geppo, Modern Haiku, Frogpond, and Wind Chimes. Her haiku collection Petals in the Pond was published in 1981. She resided for many years in El Centro, and later Oceanside, California.
Background
Gloria Fulmer was born in Kansas in 1925, the daughter of Frances Willard Hunt (1899–1997) and Virgil G. Fulmer (1900–2002), a farmer and schoolteacher. She grew up in a variety of small towns in central Kansas, including Fremont, Emporia, Bachelor, and La Harpe. By 1942 the family had moved to El Centro, California, where Gloria’s father worked as a teacher and supervisor at El Centro High School and Junior College. She married George Stephen Procsal (1924–2010) in El Centro in 1946. He was U.S. Navy veteran, having served in Carrier Air Group Fleet Aircraft Service Squadron 7, and long-time employee of the Imperial Irrigation District. George and Gloria had three sons and one daughter. The family lived in El Centro and later in Oceanside, California, and kept a country house in the village of Boulevard, a few miles north of the Mexican border.
In addition to being a full-time mother of four, Gloria Procsal was a prolific poet and writer, producing radio interviews, TV commercials, articles, essays, short fiction, and two novels. She was involved with youth poetry programs and was honored for her contributions to the arts by the state of California.1
She died on December 17, 2014 and was interred at Eternal Hills Memorial Park in Oceanside, California.
Gloria Procsal’s Haiku and Senryu
Gloria Procsal had been writing poetry for some time before she discovered haiku in the early 1970s. There is record of two early poetry collections, Catching A Dream and Passkey.2 She began publishing her haikai in 1975, and had this to say about her haiku path:
My early haiku were strict 5–7–5; no exceptions. Now I cut any padding, which produces smoother work. Write it, let it rest! then tighten, eliminate excess articles and adjectives. Adding a gerund enhances immediacy. Be sure 2nd and 3rd lines are in the most effective order. An interesting experience was having a haiku rejected five times, which went on to be an award winner in Kansas.2
Quite early in her haiku career, only six years after she started working in haiku, Procsal published a collection, Petals in the Pool. It received a positive reception in Modern Haiku:
PETALS IN THE POOL: Haiku & Senryu by Gloria H. Procsal; from the author: 1538 Brighton Ave., El Centro, CA 92243; 1981, 24 pp., paper, $1.50.
Reviewed by Elizabeth Searle Lamb.
This attractively produced small chapbook presents 60 haiku and senryu, plus the evocative dedication poem:
Early evening rain;
a few petals drifting
in the pool …With its quiet music, this poem sets the tone for the entire book. Many of the poems are written out of family moments, as:
Into his bedroom
after Papa’s death
the scent of lilacsOthers show a perception of the one caught moment when the poet is attuned to the natural world:
Ducks in flight
over the millpond
quicken the breezeThere is only a rare descent into sentimentality or a false note that is shallow comment:
That he should smile
in the midst of my fury
is love?These are traditional English language haiku and it is perhaps the lack of variety in rhythm, in the evoked mood which mars somewhat this collection. While the tone throughout is constant, the small variations in setting up the poems—the use of capitals at line beginnings for instance seemed to this reviewer to have no reason and were therefore an irritant.
Taken as a whole, Petals in the Pool brought a sense of quiet pleasure and an awareness of the universality of many of life’s experiences. Beginning haiku writers might do worse than to live with some of the haiku in this chapbook.
A very brief mention of Petals in the Pool in Wind Chimes issue 6 included “Early evening rain” plus three other poems:
Beside the casket,
standing mute and dry-eyed
just before the rain
Oncoming mist
still he tends her bed
of white iris
Home from vacation
someone else’s cat waiting
at the front door
Here follows a selection of some of Procsal’s best haiku published in Dragonfly from 1975 to 1988. The first one here is believed to be her first published haiku:
| Foggy morning: By the icy pool of milk A calico cat. | Dragonfly: A Quarterly of Haiku 3:3 (July 1975) |
| Snowy winter day: Picking young mistletoe From a dead oak branch. | Dragonfly: A Quarterly of Haiku 4:1 (January 1976) |
| Into my bedroom. the scent of his wet tweed and tea-roses. | Dragonfly: A Quarterly of Haiku 4:2 (April 1976) |
| a restaurant girl with bitten fingernails snapping green beans | Dragonfly: East/West Haiku Quarterly 14:2 (Spring 1986) |
| Deep in slumber, still his wild mustangs running free | “In Memory of Paul Waterman, July 3, 1903–February 16, 1987,” Dragonfly: East/West Haiku Quarterly 14:6 (Spring 1987) |
| August rain deepens the wine scent of rotting plums | 67th Quarterly Haiku Contest, Honorable Mention, Dragonfly: East/West Haiku Quarterly, 14:7 (Summer 1987) |
| déjà vu the way storm clouds settle into snow | 67th Quarterly Haiku Contest, Honorable Mention, Dragonfly: East/West Haiku Quarterly, 14:7 (Summer 1987) |
Procsal was a favorite of Modern Haiku editor Robert Spiess, who included almost 100 of her haiku and senryu in the journal from 1979 through 2007.
| Under the streetlight The old boxer still fighting His last fight | Modern Haiku 11:1 (Winter–Spring 1980), Eminent Mention |
| Frosty morning, touching the worn axe handle— the curve of his fingers | Modern Haiku 12:2 (Summer 1981); discussed in Harley King, “Haiku Reading,” High/Coo 6:24 (May 1982) |
| her awkward body as she picks the fullest pea pods | Modern Haiku 14:2 (Summer 1983), Special Mention |
| a retarded girl & boy hand-in-hand— her one-note song | Modern Haiku 15:2 (Summer 1984; discussed in Lenore Mayhew, “Her One-Note Song,”Modern Haiku 16:1 (Winter–Spring 1985) |
| out of rainy hills they come: thin-shelled snails and plump red worms | Modern Haiku 21:3 (Autumn 1990); anthologized in Bruce Ross, ed., Haiku Moment (1993) |
sudden gust rearranging gnats | Modern Haiku 23:2 (Summer 1992); included in Haiku Society of America 1994 Members’ Anthology |
| winter solstice easing into it the jazzman’s sax | Modern Haiku 24:1 (Winter–Spring 1993); Parnassus Haiku Contest 1998, Honorable Mention |
| small mouse emerges from the melon heart— summer sunrise | Modern Haiku 25:2 (Summer 1994), 4); included in Haiku Society of America 1998 Members’ Anthology |
| a trembling man touches my shoulder … winter in his eyes | Modern Haiku 29:2 (Summer 1998); included in Haiku Society of America 2000 Members’ Anthology |
Hal Roth, founder of the respected journal Wind Chimes, was a great supporter of Gloria Procsal, and she published well over 100 haiku here from 1981 to 1989. In an astonishing departure from her established classical haiku style, Procsal published eighteen “Abstract Sequences after Marlene Mountain.” These are the first two:
| autumn lightning talk of shafting management first friday night it comes up the sandbox a blue slip for blue boys cold coffee on a sore tooth | |
| shopping the first day (as ‘to heck with it’) not to shower slap perfume turn on punk rock don’t tell you type lousy head in sink in someone’s head | Wind Chimes 9 (1983) |
Another sequence from 1987 paints a rather dim portrait of San Diego’s entertainment district:
| Gaslamp Quarter after midnight a few porno ads blowing in the gutter male hustler eyeing the tour bus — hand at his crotch skinny kid — a few crumpled bills for a piece of crack the pimp’s best girl, a snag in her hose, waves down a Mercedes | Wind Chimes 20 (1987) |
Two haiku of the thirty or so published in Brussels Sprout later appeared in top anthologies:
| the bag lady sifting through city trash rhinestones in her hair | Brussels Sprout 2:3 (1982); Alexis K. Rotella, ed., The Rise and Fall of Sparrows (1990) |
| funhouse mirror a startled child’s cranky image | Brussels Sprout 10:1 (January 1993); William J. Higginson, Haiku World: An International Poetry Almanac (1996) |
Procsal published more than 85 verses, including sequences and contributions to renku, in Henry Lewis Sanders’s journal The Red Pagoda from 1983 through 1988. Two senryu won top honors in the in-house contests:
| Behind the stacks of philosophy books— a boy with wise eyes | First Annual Red Pagoda Senryu Contest, 1984, First Place; The Red Pagoda 2:2 (September 1984) |
| through the monocular something winging between me and Halley’s comet | The Red Pagoda Haiku Contest, 1986, First Place; The Red Pagoda 2:2 (September 1984) |
| “Why do fools fall in love …” she bites into a green persimmon | The Red Pagoda 2:3 (December 1984) |
| after the foal pitching horseshoes under a morning moon | The Red Pagoda 3:4 (Spring 1986); later received a Readers’ Choice award in Geppo 28:2 |
Sanders included at least two haiku of Procsal’s on his website In Buddha’s Temple as well as this one in his 1987 print collection:
| after our quarrel walking hand in hand into rain-streaked moonlight | Lewis Sanders, ed., Nightshade: An Anthology of Haiku (1987). |
Fifteen haiku and senryu of Gloria H. Procsal’s that had been published in Katō Kōko’s Nagoya, Japan–based journal Kō were included in Katō’s 1991 Four Seasons: Haiku Anthology Classified by Season Words in English and Japanese. Here are six favorites:
| over the falls yellow fish spilling into sunlight | |
| a crippled fawn bearing the weight of pinetree silence | |
| heading east a full moon fills the empty road | |
| this winter day my old teacher has forgotten my name. | |
| the music in a stranger’s footsteps on the gravel path | |
| thinning hair the new intimacy of old friends |
Gloria Procsal was an active member of the Yuki Teikei Haiku Society, based in San Jose, California, but her involvement with the society was limited to submitting to the contests and publications; there is no indication that she participated in the various meetings or social activities. She had her greatest publishing success by a large margin in the YTHS publication Geppo. Called a “work-study journal,” in six issues a year Geppo publishes submissions from society members anonymously and invites members to vote for their favorites, which are tallied and the top dozen verses reported in the following issue of Geppo. Another feature of the journal is the “Challenge Kigo,” in which members are asked to send in haiku using a specified season word. From 1991 through 2008, 380 haiku and senryu of Procsal’s appeared in one section or another of Geppo, 65 of which won the “Readers’ Choice” accolade. Procsal included her work in the YTHS members’ anthologies, and saw it honored in the YTHS Tokutomi Haiku Contests:
| drought— an empty snail shell fills with early dew | Haiku Journal 8 (YTHS Members’ Anthology 1990–1991) |
| ending his journey nothing for the monk’s table but dried persimmons | Kiyoshi Tokutomi Memorial Haiku Contest, 1995, Honorable Mention |
| purple shadows fall across the Rio Grande— wild geese streak the sky | Kiyoshi Tokutomi Memorial Haiku Contest, 1997, Honorable Mention |
| migrating mist a wild call beyond the hill | Anne M. Homan and Donnalynn Chase, eds., Migrating Mist: 2003 Members’ Anthology, Yuki Teikei Haiku Society |
Procsal also joined the Haiku Society of America and published frequently in the HSA journal Frogpond from 1985 through 2003 and the annual members’ anthologies. Here follows a selection of her haikai in HSA publications:
| leaving the V, a crippled snowgoose rides the wind down | Frogpond 8:2 (February 1985) |
| Apache war dance falling eagle feathers drift on the March breeze. | Frogpond 9:2 (May 1986), 23 |
| long night’s vigil, even this buzzing fly is welcome | Frogpond 10:1 (February 1987) |
| the way shadows fall across Buddha’s face … his smile comes and goes | Haiku Society of America Members’ Anthology 1995 |
| fevered embrace, without knowing … you touch the scar | Frogpond 17:1 (Spring 1994); Haiku Light, January 2000 |
| autumn eulogy; chrysanthemum petal bitter on my fingers | Haiku Society of America Members’ Anthology 1996 |
| Spring shower; a lotus pond too full to hold the moon | Haiku Society of America Members’ Anthology 1997 |
| bandages off— iridescent light through new leaves | Frogpond 21:2 (1998), 38 |
| visitors gone the widow feeds a scraggly cat | Haiku Society of America Members’ Anthology 1999 |
| fingers of light— the scarred pine healing my wound | Haiku Society of America Members’ Anthology 2001 |
| a trembling man touches my shoulder … winter in his eyes | Haiku Society of America Members’ Anthology 2000 |
| breeze fluttering her undone chemise new moon | Frogpond 23:3 (2000) |
| Van Gogh’s starry night a dark spot floats in my eye | Frogpond 25:3 (2002), 29 |
Throughout the 1980s and 1990s Procsal’s work was published in a number of other periodicals, including High/Coo, Persimmon, The Windless Orchard, The Archer, Haiku Zasshi Zō, Hummingbird, Bottle Rockets, Haiku Quarterly (Arizona), Cicada (California), and New Cicada and Outch from Japan. Ten of her previously published verses in the late 1990s were picked up by Rengé / David Priebe for his periodical Timepieces: Haiku Week-at-a-Glance. The poet was also active in the Hawaii Education Association Haiku Contests and won awards in the 1991, 1992, and 1993 contests.
Sources / Further Reading
Books, chapbooks, etc.
- Procsal, Gloria H. Beach seasons. [Jackson, Tenn.]: Red Pagoda, ©1990. Poem with illustrations. Red Pagoda broadside series winner.
- Procsal, Gloria H. Petals in the Pool: Haiku and Senryu. Madison, Wis.: FAS Publishing, 1981. 61 haiku and senryu.
Print periodicals carrying Procsal’s haiku and senryu:
(Count includes citations of haiku in reviews and articles)
- Dragonfly, 1975–1989
- Modern Haiku, 1979–1998. 94 haiku.
- High/Coo, 1980–1981. 5 haiku.
- Wind Chimes, 1981–1989. 172 haiku.
- Brussels Sprout, 1982–1995. 33 haiku.
- The Archer, 1983
- The Red Pagoda, 1983–1988. 85 haiku.
- The Windless Orchard, 1985–
- Outch, 1985
- Frogpond, 1985–2003. 57 haiku.
- Haiku Zasshi Zō, June 1987, 16
- New Cicada, 1985–1997
- Piedmont Literary Review, 1987–1999
- Cicada (California), 1988–?
- Haiku Quarterly (Arizona) 1989–
- Hummingbird, 1990–1991. 2 haiku.
- Kō, 1991–
- Geppo, 1991–2008. 381 haiku.
- Parnassus Literary Journal, 1993–2001. At least 27 haiku.
- Persimmon, 1998–1999
- Bottle Rockets, 2003–2004. 2 haiku.
Haikai in sequences and linked forms:
- “Abstract Sequences after Marlene Mountain” (6), Wind Chimes 9 (1983). 6 sequences.
- Michael Dylan Welch and 35 others, “Windswept Walk” (36-link chain renga) Frogpond 15:1 (Spring–Summer 1992). 1 verse.
- “Three Runners: Senryu and Haiku,” The Windless Orchard 46 (Fall 1985), 26
- “Three Winter Haiku,” The Archer, Winter 1983, 3. Sequence of 3 haiku.
- “Three Rivers,” The Red Pagoda 2:2 (September 1984), 26. Sequence of 3 haiku.
- “Orange Sunset” by Frederick Gasser and Gloria H. Procsal, The Red Pagoda 3:3 (January 1986). Kasen renku.
- “Bryant Pond, Maine,” Frogpond 9:3 (August 1986), 32. Sequence of 4 haiku.
- “Abstract Sequences after Marlene Mountain” (6), Wind Chimes 9 (1983), 6. 18 sequences.
- “Three Vagrants,” Wind Chimes10 (1983), 40. Sequence of 3 haiku.
- “City Blues,” Wind Chimes 16 (1985), 53, 32. Sequence of 4 haiku.
- “Gaslamp Quarter,” Wind Chimes 20 (1987), 32. Sequence of 5 haiku.
- “In Memory of Paul Waterman, 1903–1987,” Wind Chimes 21 (1987), 26. Sequence of 3 haiku.
- “Baja Norte,” Wind Chimes 24 (1988), 26. Sequence of 5 haiku.
- “Monterey,” Wind Chimes 25 (1988), 18. Sequence of 5 haiku.
- “Stones,” Wind Chimes 26 (1989), 9. Sequence of 5 haiku.
- “the pear tree,” Wind Chimes 27 (1989), 4. Sequence of 5 haiku.
- “coming home,” Wind Chimes 28 (1989), 25. Sequence of 5 haiku.
Online
- Mainichi Daily News Haiku In English, 1992
- Haiku Light, 1998–1999.
- Haiku Dawn, 1999.
- In Buddha’s Temple, ca. 2004. 5 haiku.
In anthologies
- Sanders, Lewis, ed. Nightshade 87: An Anthology of Haiku. Jackson, Tenn.: no publisher, no date [1987]. 2 haiku.
- Rotella, Alexis, ed.. The Rise and Fall of Sparrows: A Collection of North American Haiku. San Diego, Calif.: Los Hombres Press, 1990. 1 haiku.
- Haiku Journal 8 (Yuki Teikei Haiku Society Members’ Anthology 1990–1991). San Jose, Calif.: Yuki Teikei Haiku Society, 1991. 1 haiku.
- Katō Kōko, ed. Four Seasons: Haiku Anthology Classified by Season Words in English and Japanese (Nagoya, Japan: Kō Poetry Association, 1991). 15 haiku.
- Ross, Bruce, ed.. Haiku Moment: An Anthology of Contemporary North American Haiku. Boston, Rutland, Vt., and Tokyo: Charles E. Tuttle Co., 1993. 3 haiku.
- Wicker, Nina A., Peggy Willis Lyles, and Kenneth C. Leibman, eds. Dreams Wander: Haiku Society of America 1994 Members’ Anthology. New York: Haiku Society of America, 1994. 1 haiku
- Dubois, Jean, Michael McNierney, and Elizabeth L. Nichols, eds. One Breath: Haiku Society of America 1995 Members’ Anthology. New York: Haiku Society of America, 1996.
- Higginson, William J. Haiku World: An International Poetry Almanac. Tokyo, New York, and London: Kodansha International, 1996.
- Priebe, David, comp. and ed. Timepieces: Haiku Week-at-a-Glance 1996. Los Angeles: Cloverleaf Books, 1996. 4 haiku.
- Priebe, David, comp. and ed. Timepieces: Haiku Week-at-a-Glance 1997. Los Angeles: Cloverleaf Books, 1997. 6 haiku.
- Brooks, Randy M., and Lee Gurga, eds. A Solitary Leaf: 1996 Members Anthology, Haiku Society of America. Decatur, Ill.: Brooks Books for the Haiku Society of America, 1997. 1 haiku.
- Stevenson, John, ed. From a Kind Neighbor: Haiku Society of America Members’ Anthology 1997. New York: Haiku Society of America, 1997. 1 haiku.
- Gay, Garry, ed. Light and Shadow; 1998 Members’ Anthology. New York: Haiku Society of America, 1998. 1 haiku.
- Missias, A. C., ed. Intersections: 1999 Members’ Anthology Haiku Society of America. New York: Haiku Society of America, 1999. 1 haiku.
- Gallagher, D. Claire, ed. Crinkled Sunshine: Members’ Anthology 2000, Haiku Society of America. New York: Haiku Society of America, 2000. 1 haiku.
- Colón, Carlos, ed. Voices and Echoes: Haiku Society of America Members’ Anthology 2001. New York: Haiku Society of America, 2001.
- Homan, Anne M., and Donnalynn Chase, eds. Migrating Mist: 2003 Members’ Anthology, Yuki Teikei Haiku Society. San Jose, Calif.: Yuki Teikei Haiku Society, 2003. 1 haiku.
Reviews and works about Gloria Procsal
- Eternal Hills Mortuary & Crematory website:
https://www.dignitymemorial.com/obituaries/oceanside-ca/gloria-procsal-6244729. Obituary.King, Harley. “Haiku Reading (haiku by Gloria H. Procsal).” High/Coo 24 (May 1982). - Lamb, Elizabeth Searle. “Petals in the Pool: Haiku and Senryu, by Gloria H. Procsal.” Modern Haiku 13:1 (Winter–Spring 1982), 41.
- Reichhold, Jane. Those Women Writing Haiku. Gualala, Calif.: AHA Books, 2000: https://www.thehaikufoundation.