Gapers Block published from April 22, 2003 to Jan. 1, 2016. The site will remain up in archive form. Please visit Third Coast Review, a new site by several GB alumni.
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Saturday, September 30
What the heck is up
With the recent hot weather
Isn't it fall yet?
A lanky hipster
mounted his silver Surly,
pedaled to hipville
Wicker Park may once
have been home to rebellion,
but now it's tired.
Labor Day's over...
A shooting in Humboldt Park.
Why do I live here?
Marketing teams torque
The cycles of nostalgia.
It's what the kids want.
not my own, but one of my favorites:
haikus are fun poems
but sometimes they dont make sense
refrigerator.
-scars scabs stupid sad
-nightmares i had one last night
-lights off stressed out slob
Pregnant, hot pants tight
bopping down the Boulevard
“Lil Kim” looks thirteen
Sam Cook, you are fine!
singing while I cook breakfast,
how I love my house
My Chi-kus (registered trademark):
The CTA bus
A very rare animal
Moves in packs of three
In my house we vote
Even my uncle voted
May he rest in peace
The city that works
No free lunches around here
Me? I wash street signs
Old Town School folksters
are preparing themselves now.
Sheer cacophony!
A couple other Chicago bloggers and I wrote a set of El haiku for No East back before GB was around. You can read them here.
I wrote these some years ago. Funny you guys started this topic.
Chicago in Haiku
I walk through projects
Late, in darkness, listening
For sounds of people.
***
Today I wander
Through the angular city
Like one with no home.
***
Spring in Chicago
Unfolds fresh sweetness in wind
Please return home soon.
Hyde Park know-it-all!
Don't judge my state-school degree.
I, too, have read Proust.
These broad streets with no
character don't reflect their
name: Old Irving Park.
Chicago reminds
me why I love neighborhoods.
Thanks, adopted home!
In my mid-thirties,
Friends moved to suburbs
(good schools)
Applebees, anyone?
word play-oh how droll!
poets, try a villanelle
beautiful word math
Street side fried chicken
Calling my name
Empty pockets, I am denied
Sex in the city
An orgy at City Hall
We get dicked Daley
Elevated travel
In dense herds moving
Will she-farts engulf me?
Fall quiets Kedzie
No tube socks or tamales
Albany Park sighs
Wish I had more sleep
PBR hangovers kill
Brats are not my friends
Wait! There's an answer
Hair of the dog will cure me
Oh! Sweet cocktail hour
Roscoe Village white
I don't really fit in here
I miss my Humboldt
__
Ex boyfriend is lame
Dude please just return my shit
And lose my number
went to doug's today,
where the fuck is doug and dog?
seriously where?
bust downs prevalent
i smell east side east side pride
not indiana?
concern for good dogs
i sure hope hot doug is fine
should i pray for doug?
One year since we split.
New girl & I vaction soon.
Missing you sucks.
allan, haiku-ist
a career awaits, poet!
start submitting them
CPS first day
"JUST GO" their marketing ploy
stay off the street, kids
dreaming of cuddles
with a boy in alaska
let's cohabitate
ten thousand if caught
cuba via canada
wait til he dies, sp**k
p you need not pray
doug's leg broke when he caught fish
i miss the doug too.
and it's far too hot
for a penguin to be just
walkin' around here.
summer can suck it
i want the fall foliage
please find me a job.
Banish to January
those who beef summer heat
let them freez there!
Look back on my youth
Edgewater was just for us
Now the yuppies hunt.
Devon, Grenada
And the Nortown on Western
These theaters are gone.
I go back in time
To the place that stayed the same
Hello Ardmore Beach!
I wrote these when they closed the Dominick's by my house. Nerdy, yes.
Dominick's haikus
Mosquitoes and mites
Feast on my succulent flesh
Goddam, how I itch!
Madness at Wrigley
Finally, "next year" is here!
Somewhere, a shoe falls
I miss working at
my sweet job on Ravenswood
making rock posters
Foolish men in charge
cannot dissipate my joy:
Returning to school.
good news mary thanks
rest well hot doug and come back strong
await marlin dogs
shit
subtract "hot"
Over at Skylark.
Down by the way of Pilsen.
Cheap beer, cheap women.
Over at the Riv.
R. Adams teases the crowd.
That shit don't play here.
Inside the Green Mill.
I saw my first prostitute.
Now I am a man.
On West Cullerton.
Scratch, peck, gnaw and devour.
My Mini Cooper.
Upon moving to
Chicago, I wondered if
I could walk at night.
A former mentor,
more than an economist,
reassured me, this:
"David, no problem.
I used to live there, myself,
in graduate school.
"My room overlooked
a minor intersection,
near where you live now.
"One night, I glimpsed four
police cars below my room.
One at each stop sign."
labor day:
my ankle itches
late night, roof, bug bite
beer and surprise kisses.
my sweater waits while
ice coffee with breakfast
refreshes early fall
Wovon man
nicht sprechen kann,
darüber muß man
schweigen.
Naked gnocchi
And a Rosemont robe
I can't wait to move.
Todays young Zulus
live f*ck it aim shoot code
young kids fall dead
Todd has a mini
another pilsen white boy
go back to kansas
I think its time
The Haiku award
See above
Sweet Chicago my friend
I will have two with everything
No smoking
Today in the office
heat and haikus drip easy
revolution, not.
Uncle, the track, red suit
funerals, dark green
including his own
Counting haiku lines
Chicagoans have trouble
Which explains vote counts
glum school faces, tragicomic packed train
sun sets sooner
Skafiend wins:
I am very dumb
haiku is beyond my mind
good thing I make pics
;-)
Wise man once told me:
If you don't get your money
Somebody else will.
skafiend made me laugh
coffee spewing out the nose
I heart gapers block
maybe mom was right.
she always said 'you are all sitting on goldmines'
Do you think we should
put together a chapbook
of GB haikus?
Director of what?
Half past three; time for your nap.
I can do your job.
*venting in haiku
Todd came to visit
mini owner seen on street
sassy car not ours
I live in Pilsen
I'm brown, but if fluff is right,
no white friends for me
does chicago say
keep to your own kind, or else?
harold spins in grave.
My chickens love me
They are always hot for me
But their eggs taste weird
fluffy of mixed race
agrees that all kinds must meet
just not mini todd
A book of haikus?
Chicago ruminations?
Start printing GB!
Sweet home, Chicago?
You’ve been nothing but a whore!
Why did I move here?!
I love all the haiku! Especially skafiend's poem about the CTA. :) I'm all for seeing the poems collected.
Fluffy is funny.
Don't know if she has a brain.
She'd probly do me.
the king mattress has left
the couch remains.
Last year’s Katrina
9/11 lessons
rising stupidity
Whole office dead
I'm listening to hip hop
Missing the Old School
i thought i had brains
they say I have a big heart
he broke it last night.
He said such sweet things
but made a fool out of me
i can't stop crying.
I still walk tiptoe
at night, but I don't need to.
She left five months ago.
frequent tales of woe
fluffy be choosing lame dudes
try todd with cooper
Fluffy
Allan, CTA over Mini
pockets no pennies, jobless
to free schedule for you
as Cubs fans arrive...
tribal tattoos and flip-flops
where's my fucking Glock?
thanks d.
Her tale of self woe,
totally mudered this thread.
Let's all bring it back.
On Critical Mass
Kid knows not Grandmaster Flash
I weep for future
Old cars on the street,
Writing painted on the walls.
No one to see it.
Urban Ethos [26]
What is Chicago's "urban ethos"?
Cool Glass of... [16]
What're you drinking?
Supreme Decision [22]
What's your reaction to the Supreme Court's decision on the Affordable Care Act?
Taking it to the Streets [20]
Chicago Street Fairs: Revolting or Awesome?
I Can Be Cruel [9]
Be real: what is the meanest thing you've ever done?
Steve / September 4, 2007 12:53 AM
On State Street Sunday
Gunshot heard by Segway cop
Perp chased and caught.