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19/09/05: "international talk like a pirate day"
Yaaargh, it's that time again shipmates - International Talk Like a Pirate Day is upon us like a buzzard upon a pillaged town. In accordance with tradition, the scurvy Radsies present the best of this year's Pirate Haikus...
beauty beyond words - except
cutlass in yer guts
This stunning example captures a moment frozen in time and as such is pure Haiku. The subject is experiencing a moment of pure Zen peace, despite bleedin' all over the poop deck. Such is the great circle of life.
treasure of the buried kind
avast! 'tis heaven!
We continue with a simpler - though no less important - piece. Invoking thoughts of wind through the hair, being perched on the bow shouting "I'm the king of the world, ye poxy bilge rats!", it captures the joy in the heart of the seasoned pirate. And it has "avast" in it.
nautical dichotomy
mayhem, solitude
Now we examine the fundamental conflict in the seaman's existence - the long stretches of loneliness and introspection, interspersed with all-too-short periods of pure violence. Which is the more fulfilling? Lubbers can never know.
cold, temperamental, heartless
and, um... salty! Yaarrr!
Finally, what many consider to be the finest haiku in this year's crop. On the surface, a fairly trite examination of the sea dog's other passion; but look deeper and a bounty of layered meaning unfolds like a parfait. We can imagine the poet, unused to the subtleties of verse yet bursting with repressed emotion, struggling to capture the qualities of the wenches he so desires yet so fears. His true feelings start to bubble to the surface but suddenly - sadly - his base instincts once more take control and he finishes the verse with a much more stereotypical (though less honest?) depiction of wenches as worthy only of dismissive ridicule. The gulf between man and soul gapes again. Aching, agonising brilliance.
