Follow-up haiku, First Reader

I didn't mention in the other day's post on the "First Reader" poem that in addition to all the thinking I did about that Billy Collins poem, I also thought it would make a great subject for a haiku, i.e., a haiku around the idea that in learning to read we, on some level, "forget how to look."

Well, that turned out to be a lot more difficult than it seemed. In the end I had to surrender pretty much all of the haiku rules and was left with just "3 lines" and the "short/long/short" pattern. And as far as the syllables go, I was able to almost convince myself a slight feint to the 5/7/5 by going with 7/14/7 (but that's really just random and there is no feint as all).


hovering here, buzzing there
nearby the boy reading of spaceships jumping hyperspace
unnoticed the bumblebee


I'm generally happy with it. I like the implicit comparison of the spaceships with the bumblebee. I also like interplay between "jumping hyperspace" being something standard in ski-fi but not actually something humans have yet figured out how to do with the "bumblebee argument." Related, bees do seem to "jump" from one hovering spot to the next much like how I imagine hyperspace jumping spaceships would do it. Finally, as well, I like the haiku-esque ambiguity of the word "nearby." Is the bee nearby the boy or the boy nearby the bee? Both, right? And who is the unnoticed?

But when you read it, does the "so absorbed in reading that you forget how to look" theme come through? I don't know.

Meanwhile, since this is a blog as much about the process and struggle of my own attempts at the craft, below you'll find the various 4 days worth of false starts.

In Learning to read
Is forgetting to live
I turn the page

Reading of fantastic ships
In outer space the boy never notices
The butterfly alight on his shoulder

The boy on the park bench
reading

Spaceships jump hyperspace
Across the 

Alone with a book in the park
the boy 
The bumblebee hovers unnoticed


Reading sci-Fi 
The park bench reader
Spaceships jump hyperspace
  
Bumblebee hovers

On the park bench
Reading o

The park bench reader


The butterfly alights unnoticed 

Moving faster than you'd think
Mercury crosses the sun

Reading under the willow

Hyperspace ships leap
across 

Beneath the old willow

The space opera 
the words rocket

Reading sci-fi eyes
glazed under the old willow
the bee comes and goes

Hovering around
A boy reading of spaceships
The bee goes unnoticed 

Hovering and buzzing around
the boy reading of spaceships jumping hyperspace
the bumblebee goes unnoticed

Hovering and buzzing around
the boy reading of spaceships jumping hyperspace
unnoticed the bumblebee

Hovering and buzzing around
the boy reading of spaceships jumping hyperspace
here and there unnoticed the bumblebee

hovering here, buzzing there 7
nearby the boy reads of spaceships jumping hyperspace 13
unnoticed the bumblebee 7

hovering here, buzzing there 7
nearby the boy reading of spaceships jumping hyperspace 14
unnoticed the bumblebee 7