Forums → Art, Music, and Writing → Haiku Contest - Broken Bond (page 531, due: Feb 2)

The Depressing award goes to 1337Player:

I am getting old
My beating heart is slowing
I'm waiting for death.

I don't mean depressing in a bad way. This Haiku manages to grab hold of the emotions and toy with them a little. Each line of the Haiku works well with the next and build up what is a very good Haiku.

The Progression of Man award goes to TuxedoPenguin:

Time, goes on and on
Landscapes are always to change
Trees, become freeways

This Haiku is quite poignant really. It tackles ageing and the way in which we're spreading our influence over the land and how our dominance over the world is continually growing and perhaps not for the better - this is a good Haiku but not quite 'there' yet.

The Oyster Award goes to Freakenstein:

Coming of Age nigh,
To finally make your mark,
Your calling awaits.

Another brilliant Haiku from Freakenstein. Also a nice take on the theme - the coming of age, reaching that point in your life where you are a man (metaphorically of course - even the women are men) and the world stretches out in front of you - free to follow your calling and your dreams.

The Time Trial award goes to Ernie15:

Years beyond counting
Father time has passed me by
My time is not long

We are all locked in a struggle and a 'race against time' which we we always lose. The personification of Time as the person against whom you are racing is a good one. A well-done Haiku.

The WTF award goes to Dudeguy45

as time grows shorter
my gratitude toward life grows
like my kidney spots

Either I'm wrong or they're supposed to be called 'liverspots'. Besides that little jibe - A nice juxtaposition of the shortening of life with the growing of gratitude and a smooth Haiku.

The broken hourglass award goes to Google567:

My bones and heart ache
silently I cry "I'm old"
Time sadly lost now

Another really sad Haiku, which is probably to be expected given the theme - but it's always another really well written Haiku. Time seems to slip away from all of us and we can never get it back until one day, we look down and KABLAM - we're old and achey.

The Treecret (Tree+secret) award goes to Zaork:

Rings etching backwards
Story of a time unknown
Lost in the lodging

A rather individual take on the theme and one which I hadn't thought of at all. Each year another ring, ever repeating, when the tree falls or is felled we get but a cursory look at the tens or perhaps even hundreds of rings - each telling a different story from a different year.

The Balance award goes to obould:

Life can never last
Lives will always come and go
The reason, is age

You said this was a 'dark' Haiku - I have to disagree with you. Yes, it's about death and the dying of people but it's also about the birth of new people to take their place upon this stage we call the world.

The Ashes to Ashes award goes to wolf1991:

Time flows waywardly.
Another age fades to dust.
It touches me not.

Wow, a stunning piece of work. The metaphor of Time being a river (or at least that's the impression I got from it) worked very well. The fading of an age to dust is also good - history fades into nothingness and we cannot touch it or hold it in our hands but grasp only a few material items left from the past.

The Old Moaner award goes to Nater:

Arthritis is bad
the Advil doesn't do much
Healthcare's a bundle

Written quite directly and indisputably from the POV of an old person. An old person carrying all the pains and aches of the past and Arthritis to boot. I really did like this Haiku - it was more direct than many and got to the point - like an old person.

The I-shoulda-taken-a-left-at-Albuquerque award goes to DrPepperRain:

We tend to grow old
But without time we are lost
We have lot's of time

Heh, sorry for the award title - it seemed appropriate. Anyway, I enjoyed this Haiku, it certainly fit the theme and shows how time lays the path ahead of us and how without it we would have no path to go down and how we'd be left lost.

The Always look on the bright side of life award goes to thepossum:

Brain cells are dieing,
Yet I am at my smartest.
Aging can be good.

I definitely preferred this over your previous Haiku possum. We often look at ageing as a bad thing, growing older is seen as a negative thing - however, as this Haiku shows, we can accumulate more wisdom as we grow older and become smarter.

The World-Weary award goes to pHacon:

Feel time flow onwards;
The end draws ever closer.
I tire, yet sleep not.

Death is often euphemised as 'the big sleep' and this Haiku takes full advantage of that. A person has grown old and tired and now just longs to rest and yet although the end draws nearer the end doesn't come just yet. This works on a number of levels and is one of pHacons best so far - if I do say so myself.

The Bronze award goes to snipershot325:

A wall of old tools-
lit by the light of their time-
aching to be used.

A well deserved bronze award. The personification of the tools and the way in which they ache to be used after so long shows the theme of ageing exceptionally well - and the wording and description couldn't be faulted.

The silver award goes to AKnerd:

Placed on graves of foes
Old rose still has many thorns
But longs to be bare

This was a beautiful Haiku - it almost made me shed a tear. The idea of a person being a rose, with many 'thorns' was original. The juxtaposition against what I'm assuming is a war veteran is undeniably genius and this Haiku was so close to earning the merit (It's always so hard to decide between the last 2).

The Gold Award and therefore Merit Winning Haiku is FallenSky's:

Spurred by the aging
The forgotten one will be
the best of them wines

Well, I guess this is what I get when I tell Fallen to write a good Haiku. The ageing of wines, the forgotten that time passes by and a multitude of other thoughts and ideas are inlaid as part of this Haiku - it's as close to perfect as any Haiku i've read before and tackles the theme spot-on.

Congratulations FallenSky, go collect your Merit, you've earned it!

Now then:
Next theme - The Universe
Next deadline - 22nd of August
Next judge - FallenSky

And remember everyone - Happy Haiku'ing!

Escape Earth's cages,
Let free your mind and set sail.
Is there a limit?

I prefer we revert to the old ''single-judge'' system if the present one if flustering you peeps.

To be completely honest with you all, I was quite skeptical about how this is turning out. However, this is the only way to keep contests from being one-sided. Complementary to this, we are here to hone our poetry skills, not to get doggie treats.

I prefer we revert to the old ''single-judge'' system if the present one if flustering you peeps.

If you hadn't won this contest because you were judging, it's entirely possible Avorne would have. Also, it's not like you didn't write good haiku before you were a judge, so no one thinks Avorne or yourself is being biased. You won because you wrote a good haiku, not because you gave Avorne first place last week.

There's really no point in competing if the judges are going to ignore entries just because they want to make things "fair". So I think we should keep things the way they are.

we are here to hone our poetry skills, not to get doggie treats.

Exactly. And it's easier to hone my skills when I'm critiqued by two different people with two different perspectives.