By Jack Limpert
Poynter had a haiku journalism contest last week—here’s how they explained the contest and judging:
While haikus traditionally can express ideas, they are more often the product of some direct experience with nature. So we gave preference to haikus with details and things, rather than notions or opinions.
Various traditions of haiku allow the poet to order the 17 syllables in a variety of ways. Our standard was the most common: three lines: 5 syllables, 7 syllables, 5 syllables. We gave points for interesting interactions of the lines: comparison, contrast, paradox,tension, resolution, epiphany.
The content had to be about journalism and the news media: its culture, mission, practice, frustrations.
The five winners:
By Gabriela Guedez
Seas of black coffee
Blank paper boats sink empty
Deadline is coming
By Smiley Anders
I miss typewriters
Only crashed when you dropped them
Holes in newsroom floor
By John Dillon
Ink-stained wretches learn
At fires on ice-cold nights that
Pencils never freeze
By Lillian Reed
Hands tapdance on keys
Clacks halt. You forgot to get
The name of the dog.
By Dan Gayle
Digital dimes cry
Web first binary teardrops
Pinkslips replace print
—
I entered one—an actual conversation with a writer—that got an honorable mention. (Counting style as two syllables probably should have disqualified it.)
You’re editing out
my style. Overwriting
is not a style.
———-
Some other honorable mentions:
I wanted to write,
to craft stories that shape us
But first, I must tweet.
—
Two-hour interview
Great anecdotes, juicy quotes
“That’s off the record.”
—
Seas of black coffee
Blank paper boats sink empty,
Deadline is coming
—
I love newspapers:
The smell, the thud on doorsteps,
the paywall pop-up…
—
Where is the pizza
Why hasn’t it arrived yet
Election night rage
—
Your words are quite fine
But now I must edit them
I will be gentle.
—
Speak truth to power,
And hold their feet to the fire
Brave souls in dark times.
—
Watergate was a
hotel until journalists
made it a story.
———-
And a few more I came up with:
Many editors
have failed as writers. But so
have many writers.
(Adapted from a T.S. Eliot quote: “Some editors are failed writers, but so are most writers.”
—
I’m an editor.
My job is to replace your
fantasy with mine.
—
Story: Have someone.
Get them into trouble. Get
them out of trouble.
(Adapted from an Alfred Hitchcock quote.)
—
An editor can
help a writer; only God
can help editors.
—
Everybody
talking about heaven ain’t
going to get there.
(The old spiritual actually says “Everybody talkin’ ’bout heaven ain’t goin’ there”)
—
There are only two
unfailing cures for writer’s
block: hunger and fear.
—
Half the staff writers
disliked the editor; the
other half hated him.
(Adapted from a Billy Paultz quote about Rick Barry: “Half of the players disliked Rick Barry. The other half hated him.”
—
Poverty is not
essential but it does help
make a writer work.
—
A slight editing of an Oscar Wilde quote:
It’s better to have
permanent income then to
be fascinating.
—
Don’t tell anyone
to go to hell unless you
can make them go there.
—
And my editing philosophy in three lines:
You never have to
apologize for showing
readers a good time.
It beats
the Tweets