Ha-Ha-Hai-Ku! Winners Of Our 2010 Haiku Contest

Winners Of Our 2010 Haiku Contest

Patricia Sauthoff
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6 min read
Ha-Ha-Hai-Ku!
(Jeff Drew jeffdrewpictures.com)
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Writing haiku sounds really, really simple, doesn’t it? The form is elementary: Just five, seven and five syllables, and wham-o, you’ve got a poem. It’s not as easy as it sounds, though. Since the early August announcement of this here contest, I’ve been trying to think up a congratulatory haiku for all the entrants and have come up with exactly nothing.

Thankfully, you’re all better at this than I, and more than 400 of you submitted tiny poems over e-mail, snail mail and Twitter. Nice job, y’all. Obviously, we can’t publish all of them, so
Alibi editors Laura Marrich and Marisa Demarco worked tirelessly with me, counting syllables on our fingers to pick the cream of the crop. The ones we’ve chosen as our faves in each category get a neat little package of prizes from Noah’s Ark Café, Pepper’s Ole’ Fashion BBQ, Chillz Frozen Custard and Guild Cinema. Haiku masters can swing by the Alibi (413 Central Nw) from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday to gather up their goodies.

Traditional

“Death Poem”

Half a cup of life

Plum blossoms littering the

Sudden April snow

—Richard Fye

Miscellaneous

Single, nonsmoking

diabetic vampire seeks

hematologist.

—Holly Hargrove

Jingle Haiku

Goodwill Clearance Store

Where everyone grabs for more.

You’ll sure dig the bins!

—Emily Severance

Red Or Green

Red is my mistress,

and Green is my wife. Christmas

sucks bizchochitos.

—Kevin McGuire

5-0-5 (Yeah, The Second Line Is Blank)

“The Sallie Mae Experience”

almost done, sign here,

_________________

now we own your ass

—Sierra Netz

Bicycling

The road to Hell is

Paved with good intentions and

Has a nice bike path

—Tony Santiago

Route 66

wavy line asphalt

the pipe dream pushing peddler

low rider dream songs

—Angelica Sainz

Lobos

Hordes of town folk out

Cheering all the Lobo teams

Well, maybe not chess

—Peter B. Ives

Mayor Berry

Politics aside,

Have you looked at his moustache?

It’s freaking AWESOME!!

—Richard Groot

Jersey Shore

Hey! Yo! MTV.

I get the “T” and the “V”,

But what’s the “M” for?

—Jason Zsemlye

Runners Up

OK, so not all of these are in proper 5-7-5 haiku form, but they made us smile. So enjoy!

Traditional

There is a spider

running across the bedspread

in this cool north light

—Megan Raloff

Heavy Sunflowers

Hanging out over the fence,

Eaten by the horse

—David Moroleon

The desert is dead,

Void of life. All the lizards

Must get so lonely.

—Gabby England

Miscellaneous

octopus in the high desert

to swim next to your inked body

is not all i’m thinking

—Cez C b

The train screeches in,

Passengers from distant lands,

or just from Belen.

—Michelle Valencia

Hey vatos locos

where are the 575 tatts?

only 505’s

—Bernie Lieving

The mouse on the wheel

stopped. She broke the wheel and

ate the scientist.

—Nancy Tudor

Jingle

Central, so much weird

That hobo has a huge beard

Nasty, so I steered

—Justin White

You value your fries.

Impoverished children starve.

Yeah, "I’m Lovin’ it."

—Jessa Mckelvey

Red or Green

Manna from heaven

That is what green chile is

Red is okay too

—Gabriela Irwin

Red! speed past real fast!

But officer, light was green!

Tell that to the judge.

—Ramsey Rose

Ruby, rouge, cerise,

Rojo, crimson, scarlet, puce.

Wait. I’ll have the green.

—David Martin

5-0-5

Why “the Q” is cool:

Let’s stick with “Burque”

—Steve Bishop

Bicycling

A shout on Silver.

A honk on Yale. What’s that for?

Oh, I’m on a bike.

—Juna Benjamin

Hey Velocipedes!

Stop signs apply to you, too.

Quit cutting me off.

—Lea Jones

What good are goatheads?

For flattening bike tires

They’re the best around.

—Andy Moss

Route 66

chicago to coast

I wish 491 was

still called 666

—Jordan Wayne Sawyer

Lobos

Red & silver streaks,

a pack of wild dogs they charge.

Victory is near.

—Matthew Idziak

When the moon is full

Or even when it isn’t

We are all Lobos

—Angel Marquez

In New Mexico

We like to lose our minds, Howl

At the moon tonight

—Selenah Bequette Kaiser

Mayor Berry

The hummingbirds say,

“Mayor Berry-don’t take ’way

Our sanctuary

—Ethan Kane

I like the mayor,

His name sounds like an ice cream,

Mmmmmm … MayorBerry

—Richard Groot

This Mayor Berry

can’t deport us all, but some

I will fight to end

—Hugo Ayala

Jersey Shore

Fake tans and fist pumps

Always fresh with high hair bumps

You can’t miss Jersday

—Natalia Ruiz-Fabrega

Crisp melanoma

Abs big enough for laundry

What’s in Snookie’s hair?

—Stephanie Mladinich
Ha-Ha-Hai-Ku!

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