Haiku Monday: ADVENTURE WINNER

Okey dokey, y'all, I have made my decision. It wasn't easy and if I don't mention your haiku specifically, it's simply because of lack of time, not admiration. Each and every one of these had something to recommend them, but as with most things in life, there can only be one winner.

I copied, pasted, printed, and read and re-read—silently and aloud—all your haikus several times. I read them to myself, I read them to the dogs, I read them in the car while waiting at red lights. I read them at lunch over salad and creme soda, but then I got distracted because I thought to myself, self? Why doesn't creme soda get the recognition it deserves? That damn root beer, it hogs all the limelight.

At any rate, I would like to spotlight a few things that struck me:

TROLL: For "Smokey mountain maze," a most excellent and beautifully evocative phrase. Also, "Sucking up to Judge 101" is clever, clever, clever ("Not this year pilgrim!" bwahahahahaha!) and yes, I can be sucked up to. It's spelled: C-H-A-N-E-L. But since ain't none of us has that kind of cash, don't worry. This contest remains, for the moment, honest.

ANONYMOUS: What's this? A love haiku? Doth someone lurk amongst us who is crushing on Mr. Troll? Come on, don't be shy. Inquiring, nosy-ass minds want to know. And this is a most awesome haiku, elegantly entendre-ed.

FLEUR: For Fleur, our resident Kate Bush of Haiku in High Heels, love is a battlefield. A stranger in an open car. A gas. An eventual pain in the ass. And boy, don't Pat Benetar and Debbie Harry wish they'd written "primal shrieks and steamed silence?" I know I do.

CZAR: Our resident Mash Up Artiste manages in only 17 quick syllables to summarize the entire history of mankind from unformed universe to the space race. It's pretty breathtaking, what he does here.

K9: Today's so-called extreme adventurers lack a certain something. I'm not sure what it is. Heart, maybe? Soul? At any rate, K9 nailed it.

SERENDIPITY: A relative newcomer to these here games, Serendipity's "Snow Mistake," reminds us that for every thrill we chase, there's danger, even death, ready to stick its foot out to trip us up.

COREY JO: Wrote a lovely homage to armchair adventurers everywhere who seek their thrills in the pages of books. What I like most about it, is the reiteration of the word bound, which works here because of the contrast it sets up: by virtue of the fact that they are literally bound, books allow us unlimited imaginative movement. Nicely done.

But two haiku stood out for me: Foam's and Karl's second ones, both of which put us in media res of an actual adventure. One of those adventures starts off pitch perfect and then, thanks to the arbitrary nature of Mother Nature, ends up being something else entirely. The other, which was never pitch perfect to begin with; in fact, it was one for which Ms. Foam was most likely extremely ill-prepared. But she did it anyway. As a result, both our intrepid writers ended up not with cracked skulls (thank goodness), but with bruised "bums." And egos. Well, well done.

But the one that won out was Karl's. By a nose and a smidgeon more of cinematic phrasing.

High exit, crisp, calm.
Freefall frolic. Winds change, blow.
Backward bean field ride.

Congrats, Karl! I have no prezzies to bestow this time around. But then again, when you want presents, they just mail themselves to your door.