APOLLO

Happy day in Thalos You have been summoned! Not so happy day...

B: The classic beholder story gets another look-in. Nothing abstract here but a nice pivot around the middle line: Happy day, not happy day.

Signets and beaks and Cloaks Oh my Oh why can't i ever find any

B: This lovely 2-liner expresses a very familiar feeling clearly, and has lyrical repetition of oh's /my's /why's. Plus quoting the Wizard of Oz is always a good move.

AUTOLYCUS

Killin' Harpies at work customer needs assistance.. oh boy, i lost!

(Winner of the MEAT-MUD VS REALITY prize)

B: A stirring work-versus MUD duties haiku. Reads nicely and has some intriguing double meanings.. Are the customers the real harpies? Metaphorical fighting with both customers and mobs. A surprisingly strong entry from Xena's friend, who claimed he couldn't even haiku his way out of a paper bag. I think the poet might even have learned something about himself that he didn't previously know!

BLOOMER

Justice for all a flash of blue light takes her away

L: lyrical and haunting, but a bit vague. the sense is of terror and horror and evil, but of what? to some, the vagueness may lead to intensifying the horror, but to me, it just leaves me hanging a bit.

locked gate yearning Dracula's signet inside the castle beckons

L: ahhh, the adventerer speaks! I do like this one, the hint of treasure, the adventerer enters, the fool is enticed by what may await. My favourite of Bloomer's

blue ice this heart-faced beauty Lirain

L: simple and effective, but not very interesting. perhaps a bit too short, and not enough description.

DAIMUN

a dragon looming quick, running down the mountain away to safety

B: A haiku of Great Relief. Very astute in all ways.

DATOWER

As a predator I attack...DEMOLISH!!! You're dead. He cheats again.

B: Came with a title, but haiku don't have titles - hence this can be about whatever your personal demon is. A swift little tale if very straightforward.

Luscious red berries insipid and useless for mankind. What's the point?

B: Surely smurfberries were never better described than they are here with the word 'insipid'! Nicely contrasted with 'luscious' and red. VERY despondent tone in the last line makes me hope the poet is not too depressed by smurfberries.

The weary player sees a silver disc vanish into nothingness.

(Winner: MOST DEPRESSING HAIKU)

B: Very potent haiku. I re-lived that sinking feeling as I read it. Excellent subtle play from the 2nd to 3rd lines and bitter aftertaste.

L: I like this one very much, as it is a sign all too often felt by every one of us.

Why do they haunt me? Sleek shadows stalk me, stealing possessions. Why me?

B: The overall victimised tone is certainly strong, ending every line with 'me'. The rhyme and rhythm of first two lines is almost too slick for a haiku!

DEDSUNE

Questing had begun. It was a dark and stormy night. NO CARRIER - Damn.

B: Very nice structure weighs up 2 great opening lines then follows both in punchline

Mighty Beholder. Never looked friendly, indeed. I'll be in western.

B: Confucius-style haiku reeks of diplomacy. The part I like best is pausing for an 'indeed'. Discreet tone of finale brings a grin.

Eye of Perception. Long is the journey to fight. Heads will roll.

B: Strongly presented and undoubtedly true haiku ultimately reads more like taglines for a cool movie I want to see than a haiku.

Stuck in gluey webs. Arachnos does not bind me. Enchanted, dead again.

(3rd place: ARTFUL HAIKU category)

B: Very dense entry into the abstract by the Dedman! We have the spider imagery, webs and binding both sticky and donjon alike. Enchanted with a capital E looks like a certain mob we all know. 'Dead again' has a cyclic quality like this has happened before and will happen again (duh). A great haiku about many things..

DERIK

KILL! KILL! KILL! KILL! KILL! DIE! DIE! I love MUDs. DIE! DIE! Blood, guts, gore. KILL! KILL!

B: Strong, heartfelt, rhythm-heavy, one-note, completely graceless.

"The land of shortcuts 'Can i have the dirs to circ?' Imms, chars, MeadMud, fun."

(Winner: 3rd place in BEST OVERALL HAIKU)

B: Very positive piece is supremely charming like the simple haiku of old. 'The land of shortcuts' is a brilliant 3-worder which conjures a whole world. Flow is very nice, moving thru different styles: title, question, list. Great!

all the imms are great bloomer's trivias are cool I love MUDs, nice meat

B: Another touching haiku but this time, lacking depth. Also, the phrase 'nice meat' sounds unfortunately like patting your dog on the head. Others may love it.

FIREMAN

Am I to be one... Of the Laborous school work? Or eternal MUD?

B: Fireman's maiden haiku rolls off the tongue in an almost Shakespearean fashion and raises the weighty issues with which we all struggle (Work or MUD??? Wait, I never struggled with that.)

IAD

Death has come It has looted me dry Revenge will come

B: Resolute haiku speaks of personal experience with strong twist of words.

Many roses will sprout some will stand tall most will fall

(2nd place: ARTFUL HAIKU category)

B: I think this is a great low-key haiku, though for purposes of this venue it could be considered dangerously tentative in its hooks to Meat-Mud. OK I'll just decide what the roses are about myself!.. Unbelievably well balanced: Many/some/most, will/will/will, sprout/stand, tall/fall.

Friends come and friends go unfortunatly my friends blow they killed me

B: 'How to use rhyme to kick ass'

a hero emerges he has met his destiny he is me

B: Part III of Iad's assassin trilogy is awkwardly worded and definitely not humble, but it has really got that phoenix-rising-from-the-ashes quality. Anyway, sometimes art is about saying 'to hell with humble, I'm going to scream now'.

INGOLD

We walk through sancs maze turning and twisting we go searching but then caught

(Winner: BEST USE OF LOCATION IN A FEATURE-LENGTH HAIKU)

B: A sterling haiku about the Sanctuary maze, one of my absolute fave places. Lots of syllables and 'wordiness' reminds us of all the turns in the maze. A good dead end punchline, and a very smart melding of form, content and subject matter.

Ever sure we are the best equipment we have then oblivion

B: In just three lines such a vast distance is travelled - from certainty to oblivion... geez! Scary.

KOCHANSKI

you have been KILLED! get my corpse! I've lost my equip, oh, detect invis.

B: A sobering finish in this plain-jane-but-true haiku

Argh Egam! Eeek Hiev! dimension phase, Ack webbed! Lie still, you are DEAD.

B: Strong on the sound effects. However, the heavily-vowelled opening leads to painful and cumbersome-feeling haiku (just like this sentence), even though it makes it into the 17 syllables.

Western chamber, A Shieldmaiden has arrived. you feel better!

B: Very sweet haiku. Here the poet has chosen such strong subject matter, he has to do very little with it at all to give us back the essence.

KHRONO

adept of all Fharlanghn almighty healer bring us resurrection!

B: A cry for help straight from the prayerbook of Fharlanghn. How can I argue with that?

the land of meat on it lands a fly grab a piece

(Winner: MOST PLAYFUL HAIKU)

B: Playing with the idea of 'meat'. Interesting images here, flies on meat (blech!), and 'getting a piece' in all senses of the phrase. Neat!

newbie stumbles slips and slides over mud the Temple of Thalos...

B: The beholder strikes AGAIN!!! Very sibilant haiku dumps us unceremoniously in the home of that monster! Harsh man, harsh!

RAZIEL

The Beholder's gaze will send fear into your heart Beware his wrath fools

B: At last, a vengeful haiku about fear and negative stuff. Physical formatting is a standout, visualising the symmetrical 5-7-5 structure for us. Aggressive tone and 'sending fear' are particularly good.

As an assassin I will live and I will die But won't ever stop

(Winner: MOST FEARSOME HAIKU)

B: A perfectly balanced haiku going straight for the jugular of assassin nature. (That's where I'd aim for too.)

RED

Horatio gets killed, what message appears? Suffer miss room

B: This cryptic question-and-answer haiku manages to work in one of the best lines of indecipherable crap ever spat out by Meat-Mud.

DIE! Beholder DIE! Well, guess I can't kill him You have been webbed, Crap!

B: Umpteenth spin of the beholder story has an earthy tone and probably elicits empathy from anyone who's ever been webbed and cried 'Crap!' (or worse)

REFLUX

Temple of Thalos newbies' enemy you have been killed

B: Beholder-related haiku number 357. Obviously the beholder holds a special place in our hearts. Here we have a new slant on him as the newbies' enemy. There is something kinda creepy about the no-frills quality of this haiku.

SCALES

I slap the mili i hear an order i am slapped

B: Brilliant zen-like turnaround here, with a touch of the abstract. What order? Subject-object reversal reeks of haiku structure. Niiiice!

I lie there dead no one helps me my items and all go

B: Vivid haiku tells a classic depressing story, and is made interesting by a touch of the colloquial 'my items and all', and potential dual meaning (My items and my LIFE???)

in the water i sink to see a barracuda to eat me

B: Ultra-cute rhyme scheme results in cuteness overdose

In the sky over the heavens i fall and die

(Winner: 2nd place in BEST OVERALL HAIKU)

B: WOW! Inspired by something concrete but comes across as abstract. The rhyme works really well. It has curious movement from 'in' to 'over', from sky to heavens and then to death, and hesitant rhythm. The last line is a powerful contrast. Great!

SEIRALAIN

Shower newbie with gifts The newbie is now a hero Yet still a newbie

B: VERY classically styled haiku with a pearl of wisdom. I can hear Grasshopper or Pat Morita reading this.

Buy a copper bracelet Oh No! 'Tis cursed. Into the bag. Begone!

B: Nice down-to-earth haiku about cursed objects, and cursing at cursed objects.

TRICKYONE

Assassins sneaking Angry mobs round every turn The Dark Side of Mud

B: This haiku conjures up quite a different picture of Meat as a fear-filled place where death - like Darth Vader - is waiting to strike you down. ARRRGH!!!!

WIFIDI

quenched sword whining I will be forever why I logged on never

B: Beautiful rhyme, contrast forever/never, sets us up with the holdable quenched sword.. another buddhist type truth here. Polished and rueful haiku.

Will of steel facing death which will yield

(1st place: ARTFUL HAIKU category)

B: 3-3-3 rhythm here is sublime. Look, do I really need to say any more?

steaming corpse do I see myself do I smell

B: Intensely organic haiku. Okay, it's downright fetid, and it has eerie existential overtones. Disturbing or yucky? Both. Go minimalism!

WILDCHILD

bloomer bloomer blue mer bloomer bloomer bloomer bloomer bloomer blue

B: I can't help but be touched by this haiku at first glance as it appears to be about me. And 'blue mer' with both the name and the twin blue colours and ocean reference is a work of genius! Closer inspection however reveals that apart from the heavy sound qualities, there's almost nothing else going on here. Hmmmmmmmmm.

L: I love Bloomer too, but I think someone is getting a bit of brown on their nose... ;)

XAVIOR

Strolling through Thalos. Oh no! Its the Beholder! Lie still, you are DEAD!!

B: So True! Tight sharp progression here: Strolling - alert - dead. Really gets to the essence. I feel sure that the poet has experienced this firsthand.

I stare in the hole. Blackness surrounds my body SPLAT, no equipment!

B: This haiku has a good hovering quality for two lines. The last one brings us sharply back to earth. I'd definitely agree that the sound effect made by reality as it smacks you in the face after you corpse and lose your eq is 'SPLAT'.

The twin suns rise again Metal clashing in the woods Blood spills on the ground

(Grand Prize Winner: BEST OVERALL HAIKU)

B: Staggering!!! This crystalline haiku captures three discreet moments from the world of Meat and creates from them the greater whole. With time and place, and a threatening movement from the metal to the blood vividly sinking into the ground. A series of impressions that really capture the essence of 'something'..