Zaiku
A haiku is what?
Don’t be fooled by the format;
Form follows function
Take a limerick
It insists on rhyming
(Inconsistently)
What result would come
If Haiku borrowed just some
Literary fun?
Form is still the same
It’s now just more like a game,
at least that’s the aim.
Elements mingle
Marinate in essences
Until there’s a tingle
A top-note of play
Presages many layers
yet to be dreamt up
I have a great idea.
A Haiku With Child
I might stylize this way
With the arrival
Of a Fourth Line - the Other
There isn’t much changed
Other than the improvement:
Additional space
for the wordier poets
A marketing plan
will underscore the added
thirty-three percent
In girth and length equally
Poets Laureate
I expect will disapprove,
citing tradition.
Forgetful poets
Keep what they know out of mind:
Rules are all made up.
Dwelling on nature
Makes Haiku feel authentic
but only to you
Haikus feel nothing
Authenticity much less
We feel it for them
and hence haikus feel it back
A mirror of us
Dreaming up new forms
denying our agency
A poet I am
not for I am a poem,
your obedient servant
Of the New Haiku