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Critical Analysis #1
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Ted Reynolds
Member
since 1999-12-15
Posts 331


0 posted 2000-01-19 12:59 PM


The following haiku is, among other things, a puzzle. Can you see what I'm talking about, or should I build in more hints?
(Explanation of origin of haiku to follow after input.)

      HAIKU
   Holding his sticks out
  Under two feet of fresh snow
    He waits for spring thaw.


© Copyright 2000 Ted Reynolds - All Rights Reserved
haze
Senior Member
since 1999-11-03
Posts 528
Bethlehem, PA USA
1 posted 2000-01-19 01:05 PM


Its a sapling...your talking about a new-last spring tree...right?
jbouder
Member Elite
since 1999-09-18
Posts 2534
Whole Sort Of Genl Mish Mash
2 posted 2000-01-19 01:11 PM


Ted:

Perhaps this is a Haiku about the Haiku. The two feet of snow represents the first two lines of the Haiku.  The meaning of the Haiku is the sapling and the third line the twigs.  The thawing represents the gradual, eventual understanding of the philosophical meanings of the Haiku.  

Or maybe the sticks are the Haiku, the sapling the meaning, and the snow the meaning's obscurity.  

Just wild guesses here so stop laughing.  

Jim



[This message has been edited by jbouder (edited 01-19-2000).]

Hawk183
Member
since 1999-12-24
Posts 130

3 posted 2000-01-19 04:17 PM


Ted,

I really like Jim's idea here...although if I was a betting man I would go with Haze  
A fun piece nonetheless!

Hawk

Kirk T Walker
Member
since 2000-01-13
Posts 357
Liberty, MO
4 posted 2000-01-19 08:53 PM


Here is my solution to the puzzle:  

A Canadian rock n' roll drummer, had a few too many drinks, stumbled outside after a gig, passed out, face down in the snow.  Then a sudden and violent blizzard covers his body with snow.  He freezes to death, his hands frozen, clasping his drum"sticks". He waits for the snow to thaw so they can find his corpse.  

Not really, but I didn't have as good a guess as haze or Jim.  I would say the title Brave Little ****** leans the poem toward Brave Little Tree, but what do I know?  I thought it was a drummer. ha ha  Nice poem.  

Brad
Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705
Jejudo, South Korea
5 posted 2000-01-19 09:09 PM


Ah, come on guys. This one's obvious. It's a snowman caught in a blizzard who has a Fruedian death complex thing going.

Brad

J.L. Humphres
Member
since 2000-01-03
Posts 201
Alabama
6 posted 2000-01-19 10:52 PM


  It's a what if piece about if Sonny Bono would have been lost and not found 'til the thaw.I don't see where the title fits in with the theme though.
                    J.L.H.

 Jason
I...I have seen the best minds of my generation...
--Allen Ginsberg

warmhrt
Senior Member
since 1999-12-18
Posts 1563

7 posted 2000-01-19 11:08 PM


Well, here's my logic. (yeah, right)  There are eight stars after "Bold Little", and there's a kid's story, "Brave Little Toaster", ahhhh .... a camper holding sticks out for cooking over the campfire, gets buried in an avalanche with only the sticks showing. I know that's not it, but....
warmhrt
Senior Member
since 1999-12-18
Posts 1563

8 posted 2000-01-19 11:10 PM


Well, here's my logic. (yeah, right)  There are eight stars after "Bold Little", and there's a kid's story, "Brave Little Toaster", ahhhh .... a camper holding sticks out for cooking over the campfire, gets buried in an avalanche with only the sticks showing. I know that's not it, but....

I think it is really saplings, also.

Wordshaman
Member
since 2000-01-17
Posts 110
Illinois, USA
9 posted 2000-01-20 04:36 AM


Well, you've got the drummer part right...but it's actually Motley Crue's drummer, Tommy Lee.  It's a poem about the Crue's late-eighties drug abuse.  The snow is actually cocaine.  It's a poem about trying to get in from the cold of isolated drug abuse, into Pamela Anderson's (Lee's)arms.  

Like that was so hard...c'mon guys!

Ted Reynolds
Member
since 1999-12-15
Posts 331

10 posted 2000-01-20 08:17 AM


I was going to post an explanation this morning, but reading these guesses is *such* fun.  I guess I'll post the clearer version and the origin story this evening.  Let me admit that *one* of you got it (almost).  And here I thought it was *obvious*!
Ted Reynolds
Member
since 1999-12-15
Posts 331

11 posted 2000-01-20 04:42 PM


The first snow of the season was just a sprinkling, but it *was* snow.  I bundled up and went out, and while my wife held my baby up to the inside of the window, I collected snow from ten square feet, and created her first snowman.  (Good for you, Brad.)  It loomed a good four inches high, and was a masterpiece.

That night it *really* snowed.  In the morning I looked out over a level sheet of two-foot-deep snow.  I couldn't help imaging my poor snowman trying to keep his spirits up under all that, and so I wrote my haiku.

            Brave little snowman,
         Buried in two feet of snow
            Waiting for spring thaw.

I've played with it a lot in the last week, fitting it together in a dozen ways. Renewed input would be nice. (I know, I know -- you think he's had it.  But shhhhh,*he* doesn't know that.  And anyway, don't we believe in miracles?)

jbouder
Member Elite
since 1999-09-18
Posts 2534
Whole Sort Of Genl Mish Mash
12 posted 2000-01-20 04:55 PM


Touche' Mr. Ted.  

 Jim

"If I rest, I rust." - Martin Luther


Ted Reynolds
Member
since 1999-12-15
Posts 331

13 posted 2000-01-20 05:15 PM


But now I've changed my mind and decided that I was mistaken, and Jim was right from the beginning -- the real answer to the first posted haiku IS the haiku itself.  Sorry to have misled you.  Bye.
jbouder
Member Elite
since 1999-09-18
Posts 2534
Whole Sort Of Genl Mish Mash
14 posted 2000-01-20 05:33 PM


Smarta**!  
Wordshaman
Member
since 2000-01-17
Posts 110
Illinois, USA
15 posted 2000-01-20 05:37 PM


Tommy Lee's gonna be heartbroken.
patchoulipumpkin
Member
since 2000-01-01
Posts 196
Bermuda
16 posted 2000-01-20 11:22 PM


I refuse the truth.  I have to go with Tommy Lee, its the only answer that sits well with me.  Kudos Shaman, you are on target.
Wordshaman
Member
since 2000-01-17
Posts 110
Illinois, USA
17 posted 2000-01-21 12:10 PM


lol--thank you.
warmhrt
Senior Member
since 1999-12-18
Posts 1563

18 posted 2000-01-21 06:31 AM


Very touching story, Ted (really),
but why would a snowman wait to be melted, unless he was suicidal, and wanted to be put out of his misery?  (Just like Brad said)

Ted Reynolds
Member
since 1999-12-15
Posts 331

19 posted 2000-01-21 09:09 AM


Geez, you guys give up so easy.  I packed him *really* hard, so he'll melt a few minutes leter than the rest of the snow, and before that I'll have plopped him in the frig.  You fellows have no *faith.*  (Well, isn't trusting in God and the afterlife about as realistic as that?  (And I duck quickly to avoid . . ."))
hoot_owl_rn
Member Patricius
since 1999-07-05
Posts 10750
Glen Hope, PA USA
20 posted 2000-01-21 02:44 PM


ROFL...I think I'll stay out of this snowball fight  
Interesting haiku...I'd like to be as logical in my thinking as Jim...but I saw a sapling  

Kevin Taylor
Member
since 1999-12-23
Posts 185
near Vancouver, BC, Canada
21 posted 2000-01-21 02:59 PM


It's a secret message... just look...

   Holding his sticks out
  Under two feet of fresh snow
    He waits for spring thaw.


... becomes the beautiful

Thaw spring for waits he -
Snow fresh of feet two under
Out sticks his holding!


Very nicely done I say!

ROFL


 Kevin

"Poetry is, at once, what you get... and how you got there."


jbouder
Member Elite
since 1999-09-18
Posts 2534
Whole Sort Of Genl Mish Mash
22 posted 2000-01-21 03:20 PM


NO, NO, NO, Kevin.  You've got it all wrong!  It's:

Holding out his sticks
Under snow of two fresh feet
He thaw waits spring for

LSHIFOOMCAHMHOTWS

[Laughed So Hard I Fell Out Of My Chair And Hit My Head On The Window Sill]



 Jim

"If I rest, I rust." - Martin Luther


Wordshaman
Member
since 2000-01-17
Posts 110
Illinois, USA
23 posted 2000-01-21 05:31 PM


An alternate writing for this piece:

Tommy Lee coked out
Lonely and hazy in snow
Waiting for the thaw

LSHMHBU

(Laughed so hard my head blew up)

Wordshaman

Vincent Spaulding
Member
since 2000-01-16
Posts 59

24 posted 2000-01-23 09:11 AM


I pictured a skier, who couldn't wait for the season to be over.  I can identify with that, since I hate most of my hobbies.  But warmheart's interpretation made the most sense.  I liked Ted's second version better.  The average reader could understand it. And I, by coincidence, am an average reader.
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