In 2014, I began writing quotes for blog posts as part of my new social media and writing strategies for the year. I chose quotes because I have many of my own that I go around spouting, and to demonstrate some brevity most people I know don’t associate with me. I bet many who don’t know me but have visited this blog probably think the same, lol.

In my opinion, for quotes to be memorable and connect with people, outside of good content, the quotes have to be short and have a “ring” to them. After just penning a few, I noticed they were close to 17 syllables in length that is the Japanese haiku form. That’s when I tried to make a haiku structure out of those quotes, in some combination of two 5 syllable and one 7 syllable lines, and succeeded! That included the Words of Wisdom Quote that captured how I thought quote lengths should be, to its haiku form here on my poetry blog. The two are similar in this case, and I posted the actual quote quite a bit later than its haiku form, which I had called a haiku till now.

Those haiku I created from my quotes often lack one important element of real haiku, which is something related to nature. My quote haiku also often read like prose rather than poetry. If anyone were critiquing them not to be true haiku, I would whole-heartedly agree. That’s why I have decided to give them a different name, the haiquote.

Haiquote, of course, combines the words haiku and quote in the fashion of a portmanteau. A portmanteau demonstrates its concept by example, combining two or more words and their definitions, into one new word. It is one of my favourite words, ironically, considering it wasn’t an original word. Appropriately, though, it says a lot about my nature that this is one of my favourite words. 🙂

With my quotes able to alternate as haiku in form, the logical thing to call them was a portmanteau of haiquote, which I am introducing here. If you’re still critical on the nature aspect of the haiku to be involved, I’m going to play words on you and suggest it’s human nature that’s in these haiquotes as they are often also life philosophies I have. Not always grand and big in life, but there are also many little things in life for which philosophies would be most practical.

Some of you may ask that if the quote in prose and haiku forms will sometime contain the same words, why have both forms? That would be a very sensible question, with the very sensible answer being visual and verbal artistic presentation. If one of these quotes meant a lot to someone that they’d want to make it visible somewhere, from little Post-It notes to giant graffiti, I would suggest they use the haiquote format that is more square rather than an elongated line. Verbally, if I could structure the quote to read like a haiku, it’ll flow better because haiku have been read in all kinds of languages over the centuries, not just its Japanese original language. It works in all of them so there’s something very human about that form!

Now, do I think this haiquote idea will catch on? It’s a lottery when it comes to success with these little memes and ideas people come up with, as far as I’m concerned. However, I think I’ve got a ticket with my lucky numbers, if you want a metaphor. I’m going to push the idea with many haiquotes on my poetry blog this year and onward, and the original quote form here, like with the Words of Wisdom Quote. Hopefully, the content of the haiquote and quotes will be good enough people will want to spread the word not only of its content, but also look at links to the haiquote form. For starters, though…

Why don’t you try writing a haiquote?

Either post it on your site with a link back to here so I and other readers can go read it, or write it in the comments.

Bet you’ve never done one before! 🙂