A Haiku for All Seasons

I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess that most of you are familiar with the poetic form of Haiku. Many of us were taught how to write Haiku in High School English Class - most likely because it seemed like the most accessible kind of poem to our English teachers. If you remember one thing, it's probably that it is a three line poem broken up into lines of 5,7 and 5 syllables, respectively.

I recently read a picture book that I would highly recommend to anyone. It is written in Haiku form, and is intended specifically for young boys. The title? Naturally – Guyku. It's Haiku for guys!

In reading this incredibly well-written children's book, I learned a few additional things about Haiku that I probably should have remembered from class. First, Haiku poems generally have nature as their subject matter. This is one of the reasons that author Bob Racska cites as why he wrote this book: “[H]aiku is an observation of nature, and nature is a place where guys love to be” (Raczka).

I also learned that Haiku poems are written in present tense. Maybe you remember this, maybe you don't. But this also is another reason that Haiku is great for boys. After all, “guys are always interested in what's happening right now” (Raczka). I know that this is certainly true for me (cue the amens from Naomi and my sister, Megan)

The other thing that I love about this book is that it is broken up into four sections – one for each season. Because each Haiku keeps the present tense, the reader gets to progress through the course of the year as the book goes on. It may sound nostalgic, but to me, Guyku evokes the spirit of that wonderful comic strip that lives on in many hearts: Calvin and Hobbes. If you haven't tried to emulate the freedom and imagination of Calvin recently, I suggest you start right now.

You might be able to tell that I am really trying to avoid copyright infringement. If college taught me anything, it is that you should not plagiarize. Ever. Just don't do it. Therefore, let it be known that the following Haiku is written by Bob Raczka in a book called Guyku: A Year of Haiku for Boys. This book was illustrated by Peter H. Reynolds, and was published in 2010 by Houghton Migglin Books For Children in the great city of Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.A. You can find it at your local library:

With the ember end

of my long marshmallow stick,

I draw on the dark.