playing with haikubes
together we build with words
search for the meaning
________________________
A game called Haikubes
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Games
Hide-and-seek
the counting starts
either you have a count
to hide or you have
a waiting count eyes closed
the numbers set the pace
all participants know the rules
no cheating
ready or not here I come
sometimes the hidden ones
are never found
olly olly oxen free
the call of surrender
giving up hope
the seeker’s defeat
Summer of Pirates
It was the summer of pirates
Jolly Roger crew
set sail on the high seas
of Iowa grassland
Swords and muskets drawn
we plundered and raved
under the pirate’s flag
leaping from ship to shore
from the old Navy cot
to the Walker’s rockery
I was captain
my two year old sister
the happy stowaway
content to sit on the meandering vessel
while others walked the plank
at my command
We sailed for days
There was no treasure
only a map
tucked in my pirate belt
that led us in search of that
which we knew not
Black Jack
Dad played the cards in his living room like he was in Vegas. Teaching me Black Jack, always taking the card, take the risk when it really doesn’t matter. No bets were made, no strategy, just seeing where the cards would fall. As far as I know Dad never made it to Vegas. He got drunk and played the game in the Vegas of his arm chair. Jack, Ace, played up in hearts. Dad taught me to play the cards. He never taught me to gamble. I could shuffle like a pro, deal fast, build to 21, make the split. He always saw two nines instead of eighteen. Double the risk, shuffle and cut, play the cards out. Study and watch the cards fall, high roller from his living room Caesar’s Palace. At times he would even shoot craps.
Button Box
Gramma’s button box
all kinds and colors
mixed up and marvelous
group of six
or pairs identical
laid out on the sewing table
where little hands
put all in a line
mess them up
or count and rhyme
this one is blue
a pair bright yellow
three small and purple
four red umbrellas
or five green with turtles
fun game for tots
Old Authors and a New Game
Forty four cards in the deck. There are eleven portraits of authors and each has four titles per author. The game is to try to collect all four titles for each author to make a book. Player with the most books wins. I always wanted to draw the card of Louisa May Alcott the only woman in the deck.
Here’s a new game. Match the quote with the author and the title of the book that the quote came from.
Quote
Does a boy get a chance to whitewash a fence every day?
Words, words, words.
There are books of which the backs and covers are by far the best parts.
How that personage haunted my dreams, I need scarcely tell you.
A man without conscience is but a poor creature………
Others may write from the head, but he writes from the heart, and the heart will always understand him.
What other dungeon is so dark as one’s own heart! What jailer so inexorable as one’s self!
For his heart was in his work, and the heart giveth grace unto every art.
God of Jacob! It is the meeting of two fierce tides – the conflict of two oceans moved by adverse winds!
For men may come and men may go,
But I go on for ever.
I am not afraid of storms, for I am learning how to sail my ship.
Authors
Henry Longfellow Washington Irving Alfred Tennyson
Nathaniel Hawthorne James Fenimore Cooper Mark Twain
William Shakespeare Sir Walter Scott Louisa May Alcott
Charles Dickens Robert Louis Stevenson
Titles
Pathfinder The Legend of Sleepy Hollow The Brook
The House of the Seven Gables Song of Hiawatha Ivanhoe
Treasure Island Little Women Oliver Twist
Tom Sawyer Hamlet
Play the game without googling or binging or anything else. Just use your literary skills. If you match a quote to the correct author you get one point. If you match the quote to the title you get one point. If you get the title to the author you get a point. If you are correct with the quote, the title and the author you get all three points.
33 points You are the champion of the game and not only do you know the authors and the titles but also the literary style, famous line or theme of each writer.
22 to 32 points You really know your old authors even some that seem obscure to most people today.
11 to 21 points You no doubt have knowledge of these authors and can put two and two together on some occasions.
0 to 10 points Time to study up on your dead poets and authors.
