My complete stories & my book ORPHANS
| Godzilla's
Haiku by Steve Schlich A reading in these formats: .mov / .wav / m4a |
||
|
I. Rise Slumbering
in my sea-bed Insistent
calls disturb me Their
prying feeds my anger Roiling
underwater plume Their
cameras and weapons Ineffectual
bomb-fires Great
cries sound as I reach land |
II. Ravage Tokyo
lies before me Power
lines like sparking strings Flames
shoot from my gaping maw I'm
the villain of this piece I don't
understand the fuss
|
III. Retreat How
will they foil me this time? They
will not succeed at first A yearly
invocation My mind's
eye senses movement Their
trap for me is ready A rough
tumble from the cliff And
when they call out again |
copyright (c) 1994 by Steve Schlich
ABOUT THE STORY introduction from the 1994 book ORPHANS
I wrote “Godzilla's Haiku” in 1987 for my bad movie loving wife, Kit. And it actually got published in a magazine for writers called The Report. They even put my name on the cover, only the second time that's ever happened. But by rights, it should never have happened. I hadn't written Haiku for years. I futzed on the form and worse, mis-remembered the pattern.
The funny thing is, neither the editor nor the readers noticed.
Haiku is carefully constructed Japanese poetry. Here's an example that explains the form and demonstrates the pattern:
First line states
the theme
The second elaborates
Third line sums the two
Each line functions as the example above describes. That's the form. The first and third line contain five syllables, and the second line seven. That's the pattern.
I decided on an epic haiku, with many verses. But I remembered the pattern incorrectly as 7–5–7, not 5–7–5. I didn't notice the error until after I'd given the poem to Kit and after it had been published in The Report. Not that I would have changed anything; the thing was devilishly difficult to write!
Thinking how clever I was, I also imposed my incorrect pattern on the verses as a whole. Parts One and Three have seven verses each and Part Two has five.
So the screw-up was nearly total. There's nothing like seeing your work in print to make you wish you'd gone over it one more time.
Once I realized my error, I voluntarily declared “Godzilla's Haiku” an orphan and gave up any hope of ever seeing published again...until now.