Haiku at Work: 'the man from IT' and 'the personal performance review'

Our haiku contest this week attracted entries ranging from clever character portraits to intimate poems exploring the emotional side of work.

The contrasting themes were "the personal performance review" and "the man from IT".

The personal performance review winner is Marion Clarke:

***

missed targets

he suddenly regrets

Sunday night darts

***

The poem uses imagery to evoke a lot in a few words, says Jim Kacian, founder of The Haiku Foundation and one of our two judges.

"The pathos of the content - imagining that realising one's career goals might only be possible through foregoing even the slightest of personal pleasures - is delivered in [its] starkest terms, without commentary, and so is all the more devastating."

The runner up is Scott Evans:

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I chose the hard route

But should have chosen easy

can I start again?

***

This reflection on having one's performance judged negatively lays bare the painfulness of the process.

The poet knows that starting again is impossible, says Mr Kacian, praising the wistfulness of the third line. "The very act of asking somehow lessens the fear of the potentialities."

In contrast to the performance review, "the man from IT" allowed for many witty responses. But those that stood out, including the winning poem by David Osman, "called upon science fiction for their impact", says Mr Kacian.

***

a cursor appears

moving across the screen to

show he has arrived

***

The poem has a "deceptively light feel to it on the surface, but houses a much darker sense", notes Mr Kacian.

"The poet's computer has been taken over remotely by the IT operative. Surely this is a good thing - the computer will be 'fixed'. But only after the fact do we apprehend that what has in fact happened is the complete surrender of autonomy to forces we do not comprehend."

As if equating our collective loss of power to computers themselves, the poet describes the man from IT as a menacing overlord: "Once he has arrived, this process will never be reversed and it will never get simpler . . . and he has arrived."

The runner-up poem is by Samantha Symonds:

***

I dreamt binary

love songs, the IT man who

knows - we're one or none

***

Even here "there's a mathematical tweak in the third line that is unsettlingly inhuman, and which nicely catches the darker side of this kind of vision", says Mr Kacian.

Winning poems will be read and illustrated at Monday's haiku event hosted by Poet in the City, a London-based charity that brings poetry to everyday life.

The winners were chosen by Mr Kacian and poet Don Paterson.

The next topic is "the first day at a new job". Find tips and T&Cs at ft.com/haiku. Send poems to [email protected]

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