According to my spreadsheet, on September 13, 2016, I wrote this haiku about time travel:
On clear summer nights
I inspect the lost eons
And wonder what's next
While I don’t think this poem is one of my best, it is one of my favorites.
It contains bundles of precious memories and moments that tie together time with my dad and time with my children in ways nobody else could ever understand. It also works well as a stand-alone poem for the reader to interpret without knowing about the baggage I put into it.
I didn't start thinking about sharing haiku in comics form until 2018. But this haiku has been one that I’ve tried repeatedly to capture in this medium.
I haven’t been satisfied with any of my previous efforts. But, I think I finally have created a strip that does my little poem justice.
Here was my first attempt at making this into a haiku comic:
A few years later I tried again. This version made it into Volume 1 of my Surreal Haiku zine series:
I think this version has a lot of charm and is a massive improvement over the first attempt. But I hadn’t yet figured out the right format. My third attempt may have been shared on social media, but I think this is the first time it’s been published anywhere.
I love the background of this piece, and will probably recycle it into some future project. But this comic failed for me because it felt too static. It wasn’t comic stripy enough.
I’m proud of the latest version, but I can’t promise that it will be the last iteration. However, I don’t plan on revisiting it for at least a few years. I have too many other poems and projects to share!
You can read the post on my blog about this haiku by clicking here.
Thanks for reading!
Do you ever revisit old work to revise and revitalize it? Let me know in the comments. I always love learning about how other creatives go about their work.
Be the weird you want to see in the world!
Cheers,
Jason