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Exploring the world of comic strips through vague Japanese poetry.
April 25, 2002
The content on this page is solely created by you, the viewers, so if you want to see more, you'll have to contribute something yourself.
- Haikus are a form of poetry that consists of three lines with five, seven, then five syllables on each respective line. For example...
Rockwood is in space (5 syllables)
On a circular station (7 syllables)
Looking down on Earth (5 syllables)
Obviously, that's pretty boring, but technically correct. Try to do more than just count syllables. Be creative!
- The haiku you submit doesn't necessarily have to have Rockwood mentioned in it, but it would be nice if it related to something in the site somehow, whether it be space-related or just pertaining to a topic brought up elsewhere.
On with the haikus!
Haiku number one recalls the early days of the space program...
Spacewalking old folks
Good 'ol days moon made of cheese
Space suits optional
--Mikki
Haiku number two's author doesn't realize just how much more effort is involved in making a color strip. We appreciate the support, but every day can't be Christmas...
Full-color Rockwood!
Beauty and georgeosity!
Why not more often?
--Hannah Orlove
Haiku number three is so taken by the color-strip phenomenon that it has a stanza for each one...
Baseball in orbit.
Home run around the station.
Should someone chase that?
You dare to infer
West Wing repeats dialogue!
Repeats dialogue?
(And the reply - Yeah!!)
DRINK!
--Christina
Haiku number four seems to reflect a common theme this week...
Full-colored Rockwood!
A break from black and white ya!
Everyone drink!
--Paul
Haiku number five's author is now so distracted by Rockwood that he'll possibly soon lose his job (haiku doesn't pay the bills, Mikey!)...
I need to draw plans
Engineering for my pay
Damn this funny site!
Zero G baseball
Looks very dicey to play
Golf would be worse yet
--Mikey
Pity the author of haiku number six. In any other week, his clever cross-referencing of past Rockwood strips, current news, and haiku poetry would have been enough to easily grab the haiku of the week. Consider him first runner-up...
A haiku, in reference to the episode from May 14, 2001.
Ally McBeal goes
The way of the XFL
World genius yet? No.
And, no, I did not care for either the XFL or Ally McBeal.
--Benjamin Smith
Haiku number seven is Haiku of the Week because, ultimately, he one-upped us in a very stylish way. For the record, we like running people's haikus, and we'll make an effort to contact them if their syllables don't count out right. Usually we don't do it with quite so much flair as this week, but Karl really outdid himself. It all started with his first submission, which defended another reader...
Oh, I disagree, Paul most certainly got the joke, and deserves the ten points! So what if he didn't do it with a sparsity of syllables? He gave a fully functional joke that contains all the lines from the cartoon, whereas the haiku merely alludes to part of the joke. In fact, Paul's version is more effective in NOT explicitly giving the answer, but in letting the reader deduce it.
Team Rockwood judges
Ten points poorly assigned
Is Team Rockwood French?
--Karl Wagenfuehr
Unfortunately for Karl, due to miscounting, the above prose is not a haiku. We got a little carried away letting him know this...
Team Rockwood wrote:
Sacre bleu! It takes
A certain je ne sais quoi
To call us French, oui?
French? Oh my goodness!
Team Rockwood hates attacks on
Their integrity.
We'll run your haiku
Next week on Haiku Thursday
To show we're good sports.
But still, we must note,
That while the French cannot count,
We have no such fault.
Paul's joke was not right.
And in your disagreement
You've miscounted (six).
Resubmit line two
With the syllables all fixed.
We'll run it next week.
But you must fix it,
For it won't run miscounted.
No points for you, Karl.
--Team Rockwood
And here is Karl's final response that earned him Haiku of the Week...
Paul wrong? Miscount -- moi?
Au contraire! J'accuse encore!
Vive la différence!
Sans l'accent aigu
Syllables are polemic
Make it "assign-ed"
As for humor, pah!
No one can ever agree!
Jerry Lewis, hein?
Paul failed only thus:
He lacked the clairvoyancy.
His joke was not yours.
(Note how I defer
now in syllable counting
to your elision?)
Still, Paul was wrong-ed
(Bah, I will defer no more!)
United are we.
Zero points for Paul?
Then proudly do I confirm:
Zero points for Karl!
--Karl Wagenfuehr
Want to see last week's Haiku Thursday? Go check it out!
Send in your haiku and maybe next week you can achieve poetry fame! See you then!
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