The Longest Day in Haiku-story

I miss writing This Day in History for the Graphic. (Check out the new website: http://www.pepperdine-graphic.com/.) So I picked the summer solstice as my excuse to once more summarise Wikipedia for other people. Overwhelmed by the number of 21 June’s noteworthy events — it is the longest day of the year after all — I elected to write about them all.

‘Good for you, Nathan, but I’m not going to read about them all.’ Neither would I, so here follows This Day in Haiku-story. You get to read less. I get to write less. You get to (pretend to) learn and laugh. I get to combine my loves for history, Japan and pedestrian prosody.

Also, I refuse to change my Microsoft Word language from ‘English (United Kingdom)’. You could think that pretentious, but I’m not trying to impress you. Don’t flatter yourself. I write in British English because I want to. I guess that’s just self-absorbed, but I’ll choose self-absorbed over pretentious any day of the year — especially on the twenty-first of June.

1377

Edward the Third died

having started a long war

to rule France. Wait, why?

1547

Moscow burned, killing

thousands but empowering

Ivan, terrible.

1631

John Smith was Disney’s

favourite colour of the wind:

white. He died alone.

1684

Charles the Second

revoked the Mass. Bay charter:

‘Now they’ll heed their king!’

1788

N.H. approval

made the Constitution law,

but it’s just paper.

1798

Brits crushed Irish who

yearned for liberty like U.S.

Beaten, they drank more.

1834

McCormick got his

reaper patented. Seasons

don’t fear it — cowbell.

1887

Victoria’s reign

turned fifty. Britain cheered her;

the Empire grumbled.

 1893

Chicago’s Expo

premiered the first Ferris wheel—

revolution’ry!

1895

Kiel Canal opened,

linking North and Baltic Seas.

Hooray for Denmark!

1898

The U.S. got Guam

from Spain, and Americans

totally know that.

1905

Jean-Paul Sartre was born.

He declined the Nobel prize,

unlike Obama.

1945

After long fighting,

U.S. troops took Okinawa.

There’s no joke to make.

1948

Columbia played

the first LP. Vinyl’s still

loved. Why not 8-tracks?

1953

Benazir Bhutto,

Pakistan’s female PM,

was born. Dull husband.

1968

Chief Justice Warren

left the Supreme Court, alive.

That’s called quitting, kids.

1975

Spielberg’s Jaws opened,

the first summer blockbuster.

Sharks loathed the bad press.

1982

Hinckley found insane,

not guilty. Reagan moved on

to promote gun rights.

1982 (Again)

Chuck and Diana’s

first son, William, was born. He—

Will and Kate! Marriage!

1990

‘I am a Yankee!’

said Mandela. The Red Sox,

pissed, cheered Apartheid.

2004

SpaceShipOne achieved

private spaceflight. You can too

if the price is right.

2007

Bob Evans, restaurateur,

gave us much before he died:

lots of pork sausage.

Go Skateboarding Day

Time to shred it up

like Tony Hawk then ask your

mom for Capri-Sun.

World Humanist Day

Christian, Marxist or

Existential, humanists

love people — TOO MUCH?!

As you can see, my haiku are really hit or miss.