PACE Global Haiku • January 2006 Dr. Randy Brooks

Matt Lee

You Decide Haiku by Matt Lee The collection you are about to read comprises my daily thoughts, based on my own encounters, as well as childhood memories. Although these are my ideas, they are not necessarily situations that I have encountered. I will often use humor and irony in my haiku. I chose the title, "You Decide" because I would like to challenge the readers to think about the content of each haiku and the rengay, and then decide for themselves how it relates to them.

smokey hair tequila breath in a strange bed

Family vacations to Minnesota. We usually go in August, but have gone in June. The place is loaded with haiku potential! A few might be hard for everyone to relate to. Lily pads will often snap or pop on the top of water on a calm day. Lily pads only snap or pop when they are big. They are only big in the summer. So we have a calm summer day…those are usually boiling hot ones on the lake. And those that are not familiar with beavers will not know that they, when scared, make a splash as if someone had thrown a boulder into the water. If you see that any of these should be in my submission haiku, let me know. My book is already done, but I might put a few of these in there. smallest catch still feeds the seagull from the lake sun gently setting into an eagle’s nest the campfire becomes our lighthouse fog lifting off the lake a beaver signals his presence chainsaws in the distance a lily pad snaps slowly trolling a loon waves as we pass a male osprey locks in on his prey lonely ripple from my lure pleasant memories induced by stinkbait a trophy on display in the fish cleaning house side by side comparing whose is bigger

frozen lake pulling a fish through a hole that's too small

unfinished snowman warming my fingers with cocoa in order to pee

© 2006, Randy Brooks • Millikin University
All rights returned to authors upon publication.