One Hundred Great Books in Haiku (2005) - David Bader
*SOME EXCERPTS*
Remembrance of Things Past - Marcel Proust
Tea-soaked madeleine -
a childhood recalled. I had
brownies like that once
Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
Single white lass seeks
landed gent for marriage, whist.
No parsons, thank you
The Histories - Herodotus
Go tell the Spartans -
the Persian hordes are fierce and
wear funny slippers
Gulliver's Travels - Jonathan Swift
Thus I was first great,
then small, and much vexed to learn
that size does matter
Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
Wild. Strange. A bit damp.
Heathcliff waits for Cathy's ghost.
Women. Always late.
The Call of the Wild - Jack London
Alaskan tundra -
a dog finds his inner wolf.
White snows turn yellow.
Middlemarch - George Eliot
Stifling social roles,
small-town gossip - beware the
eyes of Middlemarch
*MY THOUGHTS*
yesterday's landscapes
jostle for identity
in our tomorrows
medieval worlds
a cathedral symbolised
frail hope and despair
Hardy's countryside
where youthful innocence
damned experience
Shakespeare understood
that tomorrow is a dream
grounded in today
