Yael Harlap wrote: > > >Vince wrote: > >Here are actual error messages seen on the computer screens in Japan, > >where they are written in Haiku. (a free verse, three line poem) Aren't > >these better than "your computer has performed an illegal operation"? > > ok, i don't know this for a fact, but i am SURE that those are NOT actual > error messages.
Maybe not, although there are revered haiku masters in Japan so it wouldn't surprise me if employees in Japanese IT departments would be communicating this way. It's an enjoyable challenge trying to fit what you want to say into the haiku structure. (For a short while a coworker and I emailed each other in haiku; few words, lots of thinking time; obviously way too much free time.) In the collection Vince sent the haiku about the crashed computer being only a stone is about as simple and profound an anti-materialism statement I've ever heard. > -yael, wondering if it was a joke... I don't know, but I did enjoy reading them. (Thanks, Vince!) The thing that stuck out to me was the description of haiku as free verse, unless what's meant by that is that the ends of lines don't have to rhyme. It's far from being free verse, though, so I'm getting my teacher hat on (it's part of "oldest child syndrome"; I don't think there's a cure). Apologies to all who know all about this wonderful form of verse, and for those who don't... Haikus always have three lines and the structure is very rigid. To be haiku, the poem must have 17 syllables in this format: 5 syllables 7 syllables 5 syllables Traditionally they also evoke some kind of image. Joni's now singing in my head: songs are like tatoos you know I've been to sea before crown and anchor me Almost haiku, or... make the "you know" one word, "y'know", which is the way she sings it, and there it is, a perfect haiku. I knew Joni's rhythm in those lines reminded me of something... no wonder I wanted to talk about haiku. And reading about Blue recently on the list... well, it fits for the moment. Debra Shea vince wrote: > > 8. A crash reduces > Your expensive computer > To a simple stone.
