Pirate Haiku is exactly that – 185 pages of haikus (one per page) about pirates doing piratey things. And while haiku purists might point out that while the 5-7-5 format remains intact, very few of these poems exhibit the meditative qualities or the kigo generally required in Japanese hai…

Wait, what the hell am I saying? This is supposed to be a review of a pirate haiku book, and I’m prattling on about the lack of seasonal references? Who cares, so long as there’s rum and seaborne violence? And Pirate Haiku dishes these up in abundance. There is, in fact, an entire chapter dedicated to rum, and another to wenches. And another, even, to pirates vs. ninjas, which would seem fitting considering the book’s format.

As East and West meet
form’s purity may waver
but rum reigns supreme
-Bilgemunky, 2010, summarizing Pirate Haiku is the most smartass way he can muster

Pirate Haiku would seem a perfect bathroom reader – something to pick up and grab a random page now and then. But in this it’s misleading because, to my own surprise, Pirate Haiku contains some semblance of a plot. These aren’t random selections, but rather poems with a progression from one to the next. A story is told, references revisited, and in-jokes formed and enjoyed. And this is what sets Pirate Haiku up a notch or two from being a mere collection of silliness. It should be enjoyed from beginning to end and in that order, because at the end of it all there is indeed a madness behind the method.

www.lulu.com/content/4200281

Close your eyes and picture a pirate sitting on a beach. Let your brain relax and let the pirate be himself and watch what he does. Does he take a swig of rum? Start singing sea shanties to himself? Shout peculiar-yet-salty insults at whoever happens to walk by? Read from a book of poetry?

Odds are that final option isn’t one that sprung into your mind – pirates, as a rule, aren’t really considered to be history’s great poets, nor were they exactly patrons of the written arts. In fact, letters – save those of “marque” or “x” – were generally pretty useless to them. But this is probably because it wasn’t until 2008 that someone got around to collecting an anthology of pirate poetry. Had such a thing existed in the 1700′s, I’m sure many pirates would have taken their literary studies far more seriously.

Raising Black Flags: Original Poetry By and About Pirates is a collection available through Lulu Press. Edited by Stephen Sanders (a.k.a. Blackbead), it features 39 original pirate poems contributed by 16 pirate poets. Most of these names will seem unfamiliar until you read their biographies, at which point anyone familiar with the online and real world pirate communities – especially the Pyracy Pub – will recognize may familiar nom de plumes.

I freely confess that I don’t often read from books of poetry, as I’ve the attention span of a jelly fish. But I’d also suggest that if you are to read poetry, pirate poetry would seem the way to go. And Raising Black Flags clearly has much to offer. Poems range from the long to the short, the silly to the somber. Some speak of real world situations we modern pirates face, such as “A Pirate’s Life For Me: Being a Pirate at Renaissance Faire” by Melody Sanders. Others tell of historical pirate realities, such as the wonderful “The Captain’s Coat”, which really ought to be put to music someday. And many others blend the real world of pirates with the worlds of ghosts and mythology – poems of mermaids, sirens, and specters.

Raising Black Flags would seem a fine gift for the pirate who has everything, or make for an excellent waiting room or coffee table book. Reading a poem here and there would seem an excellent way to add a little extra dose of piracy to our modern lives – and that’s always a good thing.