S4 E4: Humourous haiku

Hello, this is Patricia, welcoming you to Series 4 Episode 4 of the Haiku Pea Podcast from Poetry Pea. I think we’re going to have a lot of fun this week, well that’s the plan…

Today I’m joined by my three community judges for this topic of humour. Our first judge is Roger Watson, who you already know, he regularly contributes to the podcast with his own haiku and senryu and of course he introduced this topic with a workshop in Episode 23 of the 3rd Series of the haiku pea podcast.

Our next judge is Peter Draper, again regular listeners will know his work as he too contributes to the podcast.

And then, we have someone we’ve not heard from before Andrew Shimield. Andrew I know as he co-ordinates the London haiku group for the British haiku society and very kindly lets me come along, now that they are Zoom meetings. He also takes the time to act as a mentor for less experienced poets and members of the British Haiku Society.

Just a quick reminder that I’m accepting submissions for exaggerated perspective until the 20th February 2021, so if you haven’t sent me your submission time is running out. If you’ve never sent me a submission, why not make it this month? I look forward to reading it.

Now as usual I’ll start with some haiku that have been previously published. Then It’s over to you, for some sparklingly witty, wry, dry, sometimes a little sad humorous verses from you. Thank you as always for sending me you submissions and for coming along to listen.

bagpipers
just far enough away
to move me

Debbie Strange, Shortlisted : 2018 H. Gene Murtha Senryu Contest

Barbara Carlson sent me a little verse. As a retired teacher she often gets little gems like this via email. We tried to find out where it originated but couldn’t. If you know please tell us, I think it’s quite amusing. I love to think of a young person handing this in as their homework.

five syllables here
seven more syllables there
are you happy now?

poky hotel
no room for my shadow
to unpack

David Cobb from his book Palm

New Years Day-
Everything is in blossom
I feel about average

Issa, taken from Robert Hass: The essential haiku

abandoned park…
among the high grass
a plastic dinosaur

Daniela Misso
Failed Haiku A Journal of English Senryu, Volume 5 Issue 56

LAX pick up
Danté never mentioned this
tenth circle of hell.

Aaron Naparstek, honku.org

Now for our main event, haiku and senryu written especially for the podcast and the Poetry Pea Journal, of which more later…

aha-moment
the persistent neighbor’s
car horn

Mikō

retirement his new career doctor appointments
Bruce H. Feingold

everyone laughed
at the pie in my face
but i ate well

James Young

crocodile handbag
the seller closes the deal
with a snap

John Hawkhead

olive oil the virgin in the room
Roberta Beach Jacobson

In the last podcast I was talking to Ben Gaa. In a bit which I didn’t record we were discussing how I disliked snow. He told me I should write a humorous haiku about how I hated the stuff. Well I didn’t have to because Pam Joy sent me this.

snow falls
mercury rises
I shovel slush

Pam Joy

new snow cleans my yard
son’s chore done
powdered dog piles

Barbara Carlson

hitting a rock
on downhill run –
I grow wings

Paul Callus

snow day –
shovelling replaces
the labor of teaching

Shai Afsai

apologies
to the flower garden
left out in the cold

Ron Scully

our cat
declines Zoom meeting
in one purr-fect leap

Doug Lanzo

nothing left
to say
October crickets

Doris Lynch

Judges choice nomination, Roger:

round bales of hay…
cattle sadly waiting
for a square meal

Rob McKinnon

coots sans masks
social distancing
wing-shake ban

Wayne Kingston

plunging in,
fizzing-
fizz balls in the jacuzzi
fizzing all out

Karla Linn Merrifield

Now in this 4 line verse Karla has not just used the visual images for humour but she’s used sound. Let’s hear it again and listen to the repetition of fizz, does it work on you as it did on me I wonder ?

Oh and by the way, in the next podcast Brad Bennett is coming along to talk to us about sound or as he more eloquently puts it Euphony in our haiku. Do come along and listen, because there are other treats in that podcast too…

a very short play –
shush she says to me,
we are in a library

Ian Speed

urban runoff a faecal matter
Pat Geyer

colonoscopy screening
the waiting room décor …
a deep brown

Jay Friedenberg

heavy wind
the old outhouse
blows over

Lori Becherer

playing the flute
grand-dad
passing gas

Laura Driscoll

potty training
trying not to confuse her
I sit when I pee

Alex Fyffe

an apple falls
down the stairs
clip clop clip clop

Mark Gilbert

circus lion
leaps over fire hoop –
audience roars

Neera Kashyap

parrot fly-by his newly waxed car
Deborah P Kolodji

toenail clippings–
a gathering
of crescent moons

Pippa Phillips

dark matter
looming large
a chocolate fudge cake

Angela Terry

too lazy
to look up the word
lollygagging

Jackie Chou

a close friend
she calls on the rare day
I’m out to lunch

Giddy Nielsen-Sweep

a loud whistle…
appreciating the attention
of the kettle

Marilyn Ward

melancoffee
an unknown writer
feels my pain

Linda L Ludwig

Linda, I was so worried I would mess up reading this and spoil your excellent word play.

rainy season
new acquaintances
same old bar tricks

Eve Castle

scarecrow’s days
are numbered
no rains

Lakshmi Iyer

mask problems
what should we wear
for Carnival ?

Anna Maria Domburg-Sancristoforo

Staying with outfit problems, I’ve written you a senryu about a first world problem I’m tackling at the moment. I think it is self explanatory:

mother of the groom
if only hiking clothes
were acceptable

Bisshie

window shopping
she tries to lose weight
for the dress

Minal Sarosh

trash sale dress
couldn’t have more
sweet memories

Nadejda Kostadinova

I’m going to interrupt our poetry for a minute to do a little housekeeping.
Firstly, thank you to Ben and Alan who were my guests in the previous podcast. Lots of you have written to me to say how much you enjoyed the podcast and many of you have given me differing points of view and more reading and viewing. Thank you, I always appreciate it when you help me to learn.

Don’t forget it’s no Ego submission time in March. And your poems should not include I /my/we/our/us.

Breaking news

The Poetry Pea Journal of Haik and Senryu, winter edition is now available.

Remember Nika’s postcard project ? I’ve been sending more postcards, have you? If you don’t know what I’m talking about you’ll find the info in the show notes for episode one of the fourth series and the poets’ directory. I recommend sending, Jim aka Nika a card, he sends wonderful postcards in reply.

Thank you to everyone who has bought me a coffee, and is helping me to keep the Haiku Pea podcast free. I would really like to keep it that way, but I do have costs. That’s why I put the buy me a coffee button on the website. I really appreciate the help, thank you.

Before I get back to the poetry, do you fancy being a community judge? I’m looking for community judges who would like to read submissions, do a zoom call with me and a couple of other members of the community, write a commentary and of course be on the podcast. I’m close to having a panel in these time zones: California, North Carolina and Europe so I urgently need volunteers for those areas, but if you want to take part, please let me know, wherever you are. I’ll make it happen.
Now back to the poetry:

sudden raindrops
pelt my page
my lifestory

Máire Morrissey-Cummins

grey skies
matching grey hair
covered by grey hat

Ellen Urowitz

boys alone
the sound of sniggers
in a carton box

Christina Chin

squirrel
darting in and out of traffic
nuts

Ronald K Craig

bear hibernation –
survival
of the fattest

Bill Fay

Judges choice nomination, Peter:

Spider in the bath
rope on the soap
ten hairy legs

Wendy Gent

Cyndi Lauper
streaming from the speakers
— tea steeping

B A France

a seagull
swiping my fish and chips
from my hands

Katherine E Winnick

sunset clouds—
a crow crosses the road
riding the cow

Neena Singh

beet salad –
I crunch through lunch
with Kerouac

Dorothy Burrows

Wednesday
neither beginning nor end
mid-week crisis

Kim Russell

cherry blossoms . .
I only need to write
two lines

Valentina Ranaldi-Adams

turtle on a log
sometimes
a cliche will do

Brad Bennett

refuse dump
two black bears slouch
on a stained sofa

Debbie Strange

morning stroll
a lark’s gift
on my head

Nisha Raviprasad

old family photo…
grandma and I
with toothless smiles

Hifsa Ashraf

a picnic
on dry grass—we share
our allergies

Richard Tice

ready to go …
coats lined up
in the hallway

Daniela Misso

her staccato
against his legato
bickering again

Natalia Kuznetsova

spring morning
a dawn chorus answers
his peaceful snore

Robert Witmer

julienne carrots
how French translations upgrade
our expectations

Lorraine A Padden

years of German study—
ready to speak
in the present tense

Christine Wenk-Harrison

on his cheek
a razor nick –
brain surgeon

Janice Doppler

cheering
the great conjunction…
it’s a plane

EL Blizzard

ripples
tracking a skipping stone…
lake espionage

Srinivas S

first frosts
freezing my smile
till warmer times

Bakhtiyar Amini

early morning . . .
she makes the bed
with me still in it

Bill Waters

Bill is one of my new friends on Instagram. Those of you with Instagram accounts, don’t forget to use the hashtag #poetrypea for your haiku. Then go and have a look at other work on the hashtag and show them some love too.

afternoon snow
the hen doesn’t notice
the sky is falling

Kristen Lindquist

on a blanket
watching seagulls
steal a picnic

Christopher Peys

ducks waddle
over the pond
still water

Hannah Hulbert

bug of the day
swimming in my coffee
well caffeinated

Richard Bailly

spring morning
both legs in one side
of my underpants

David Oates

After Issa :

banished
to celeb island –
screeching egos

Peter Adair

there’s a hole
in my bucket list, my bucket list
a hole

Robert Horrobin

paunch during lockdown
how he competes
with his pregnant wife

Arvinder Kaur

sunset –
the moon
goes green

Eugeniusz Zacharski

a beetle
floats on a birch leaf
still eating

Richard L Matta

empty beer cans
in a basement garden
ruddy gnomes

Tony Williams

bumpy flight
a nun hands me
her spare rosary

Bona M Santos

under the bed
with the dust bunnies
today’s motivation

Julie Bloss Kelsey

zoom meeting
I think I put on too much
parfume

Maya Daneva

Ash Wednesday
grandpa gives up
his combover

Nika

sweater
from last season
one size too small

Sherry Grant

his work done
the gas repair man
lights his cigarette

Peter Draper

loud snores
I tickle him through
a hole in my sock

Vandana Parashar

year’s ending
soccer field port-a-potty
frozen poop

Oliver Porter

a hurricane of papers tail wagging
Sharon Mahany

Judges choice nomination, Andrew:

After Wordsworth:

almost poetic
I wandered lonely
on a locked-down high street

Tracy Davidson

Don’t forget you can find out the eventual winner of the judges’ choice in the Spring edition of the Journal when it’s out.

Thanks you for coming along and listening today. It’s been lovely to have your company.

Remember I’m accepting submissions via email for “exaggerated perspective” until the 20th February, 2021.

Please join me again in a couple of weeks when I’ll be chatting to Brad Bennett and Bruce H Feingold and there’ll be some other threats too. Till then, keep writing…