The Haiku of Now Challenge Winners
A behind-the-scenes glimpse at the Vocal Curation Team’s top picks from The Haiku of Now.
The haiku often gets treated as an exercise of how much can be said in a small space. How much weight those seventeen syllables can carry.
The Haiku of Now challenge moves in the opposite direction.
It asks for less. Less explanation. Less reaching. Just a moment, as it happens.
These selections stay there. Close to the present, shaped by attention rather than interpretation.
🏆 Winners
Micro Moment by Meredith Harmon
A small, precise moment of looking closely, getting it slightly wrong, and correcting it right away.
Redacted by Sara Wilson
After a brief flicker before everything settles and stays there in a steady hum.
Attachment by Travis Dylan
A waitlist email appears beside a photo of a gravesite, the two moments held side by side.
180 Seconds by Cristal S.
A tense, counted wait moves through the body as two stripes appear, holding the moment in place.
Continuity by Lamar Wiggins
Continuity zooms in on the moment a shell breaks and something pushes through.
🎖️ Runners-up
- writing in the dark by Ashley Lima
- i n t e r l u d e by Kristen Balyeat
- Coffee by Emilie Turner
- Between Keystrokes by Tim Carmichael
- Lighting a Candle by Madison "Maddy" Newton
- Soft Mechanics of Afternoons by Ella Bogdanova
- Untitled Haiku by Bride of Sound
- locking up by Raistlin Allen
- Page Turner by Luna Jordan
- Coffee news by Cadma
- Comforter by Jada Ferguson
- This Moment by Obsidian Words
- Articulatory Phonetics by Harper Lewis
- Pages by Adam Kolozetti
- Sub-Zero Temperatures by Polite Adjacent
🏅 Honorable Mentions
- Preparation by D. J. Reddall
- Refresh by Alicia Melnick
- Ripples On The Lake by Darla M Seely
- After the Children by Rene Volpi
- Winter Resilience by Lana V Lynx
- A Haiku Set in a Cafe by J. Otis Haas
- Ice Storm by Penny Fuller
- Sauna by Tina D. Lopez
- Gold by Rick Henry Christopher
- Paper Wasps by Stacey Mataxis Whitlow (SMW)
Check out the latest on Vocal Challenges.
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Everyone Is Acting Normally Challenge Winners
In the Everyone Is Acting Normally challenge, something is clearly wrong, but no one stops to name it. Across the shortlist, that wrongness appears as resurrections, surveillance, disappearance, and denial, each treated as part of daily life.
By Vocal Curation Team12 days ago in Resources
Comments (27)
congrats - loved these!
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Congratulations everyone❣
Congrats everyone! 🎉
Congrats to all winners and placegetters!
Congratulations everyone! 🎉💖🎊🎉💖🎊
Congratulations to everyone!
Congratulations to everyone!!
Now this seriously made my week, if not the whole month! Thank you, Vocal! I do not envy your task of judging over a thousand wonderful haikus, and I’m grateful that mine was picked. Congratulations to everyone listed! 🎉🎉
Congratulations to the winners! Will go through and read the ones I missed!
Thank you, and congratulations! boing boing boing squee! boing boing...
Congratulations everyone!
Wow, some if these carry so much more than one would ever reasonably expect from seventeen syllables. Mind-blowing work. Congratulations to all!🍾🥂
Can you imagine reading this many haikus without gin? Congratulations to all of you from writers to readers!
congrats everyone
Congratulations everyone!
Thank you so much, Vocal! So grateful! Congrats to all the amazing winners! 💫🩷💫
Congrats 🎉 peeps!
Congratulations everyone! 🥳
I looked at the screen in pure shock for a few seconds when I saw my name. 🫠 What a nice surprise this morning!! Congrats to everyone and thank you Vocal!
Congratulations to all
Congratulations to all 🦋🌺🦋
Congratulations to all!
Congratulations all!🎉🎉🎉
Congratulations 🎊