108 Breaths

A haiku is but one breath. It is the kodak moment of modern poetry and it proves all Picasso needed to write a picture was 17 syllables. In 2004 Mark Wollacott moved to Japan and discovered this perfect poetic form. One day seven years later he was digging around the old boxes under his bed the ones he'd brought back from Japan with him when he re-discovered a dusty notebook crammed full of haiku. A few hours later he'd found hundreds more. 108 Breaths represents the best haiku of his time in Japan. They chronicle the ups and the downs the oddities and the small moments that make life worthwhile. His first month alone saw six typhoons and three earthquakes. Every night when he went to bed he received a dozen mosquito bites and he formed a long alliance against the tatami ants with a gecko named Hiro.