Summer is by far my favorite season. I used to think that it was because my birthday is in August. Later, I figured that it was because summer was the only time my family ever went anywhere.
But this year I realized that I love summer because it is a long, hot stretch of nothing. There’s no school. My children have long breaks from lessons and practices. You have whole weeks with nothing on the calendar.
After a busy school year of balancing work with the demands of modern parenthood, a set of days or even weeks with no obligations is a balm to my soul. I love secretly observing how my children learn to cope with their boredom.
Last summer my kids started writing a steampunk Broadway musical. This summer there has been a lot of card games, reading, and ukelele playing.
Sadly, I already feel the gravitational pull of September and school on my attention and on our family’s schedule.
This week’s comic is about holding onto the nothingness of summer. It comes from the second issue of my Haiku Pop zine that will be published next month.
Poetry Comic
Personal Update
There’s a lot going on at Weirdo Poetry this summer. Haiku Pop: I Stare at the Sea comes out next week. Haiku Pop: The Joy of Nothing will be released on August 30th. Starting this Friday or Saturday, I will be posting all of the comics from Haiku Pop: I Stare at the Sea one page at a time on my social media channels. I’m even creating TikTok and YouTube versions where I narrate the poems.
This way even if you can’t buy a copy of Haiku Pop, you can still enjoy and share the comics.
I am trying to make Haiku Pop a monthly publication. I’m still planning on publishing another zine in September that’s fiction-oriented. I am also working on a graphic novel that is a collection of science-fiction story poems set in space. The illustrations are all works of digital collage. I don’t have a publication date or title for this volume yet. But it will be released as a book and not a zine.
Thanks for reading!
Be the weird you want to see in the world!
Thanks,
Jason