more haiku

More haikus, and thoughts on the Ruthless Editor

Haiku is the “Ruthless Editor”. You may have a phrase you love, words you adore like beautiful children, and haiku will forch you to cut out the less beautiful ones.

My verses are conversational, I’d never claim I keep to a pure, classic form. But I do try hard for each line to contain a complete thought, and not bleed into each other. Certainly you want more structure than just a seventeen syllable sentence. My third line is usually a flip or a punch line, or at least a little twist.

I use dryer sheets
I can’t tell if they do jack
but still, just in case

under the spotlight
where my flirting goes to die
first dates at starbucks

I watch for them in lyrics. When they occur in a song you can see how the 5-7-5 rhythm makes a bouncy, choppy, percussive rhythm.

and if you can’t be
with the one you love honey
love the one you’re with

If the lyric partially fits, and is too good to pass up, then I add commentary

first I was afraid
(tell it to me, gloria)
I was petrified

Or add an attribution

whats so funny bout
peace love and understanding
- elvis costello

Hijack a movie quote

“something you should know...”
(best movie quote after sex)
“I’m not left handed”

An ideal symmetry is when the verse works after swapping the first and third lines. Then you can choose which way it flows.

what a creepy tune
The Girl from Ipanema
from her point of view

i don’t drop breadcrumbs
going backwards never helps
when i lose my way

I wrote a simple mac utility to count as I type. It dynamically shows syllables per line and signals when you have the right syllable count, as well as when the whole verse is valid.

This is from pre-LLM times. AI is imperfect at counting syllables, like counting R’s in ‘strawberry’. I suspect there is also an intuition gap in that syllables are an auditory phenomenon as well as linguistic.

Part of the satisfaction is finding just the right word that works, like in a geometric puzzle. There’s a little dopamine hit when it locks into place, like getting a perfect fit in tetris. Ruminating over the perfect word helps hone ones writing here and elsewhere.

sleep. fitness. diet.
i’m tired of bribing my brain
to make dopamine

i hold myself up
perfect is my enemy
good is good enough

everybody thinks
they are above average
drivers and lovers

stars, from the roof deck
i liked it more illicit
when it was just roof

“don’t put all your eggs-“
(easy advice from people
who got lotsa eggs)