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Fun with Legal Writing ? and Anchovies (with a main dish of haiku)

Almost every good legal writer will say, ?good legal writing is simply good writing.?

David Giacalone, in his 12/29/07, f/ka post, you tell ?em ? hold the anchovies, teaches about writing haiku (and writing generally) by comparing 3 haiku/senryu, from the tantalizing to the gristly. Try to see and feel (and even smell) the differences:

I found these all at and copied them from David?s post:

*********************
first date?
the little pile
of anchovies.

?????? by Roberta Beary - from The Unworn Necklace (Snapshots Press, 2007); Frogpond (Winter 2007), 1st Place, Haiku Society of America?s 2006 Gerald Brady Senryu Contest

Davids words: ?In the hands of a lesser poet ? or one who was simply not willing to take the time to invoke ?the first-date anchovy experience? with a sensory image rather than a mere explanatory phrase ? we could have wound up with an epigrammatic ?insight,? a wry-ku bon mot such as:?

i know the rule:
no first-date
anchovies

?Or, perhaps a palpably inferior, regretful ?sigh-ku,? like:?

no goodnight kiss ?
why did I have anchovies
on our first date?

The whole anchovy-post can be found here. If you don't laugh, or at least smile, there's no hope for you.

Happy First Weekend of 2008 - oy!

Full post as published by Oregon Legal Research on January 04, 2008 (boomark / email).