Haiku from Isle au Haut in Maine (Haut-ku?)

I thought about Jack Kerouac a lot during our three days on Isle au Haut.

This is not surprising because a) I think about Jack a lot in general, what with him being my favorite author and the writer who changed my worldview irrevocably in that clichéd moment when I first read On the Road in tenth grade;¹

and b) because I brought Desolation Angels, Jack’s book that details his summer as a fire lookout on Desolation Peak in the North Cascades, to read there — my favorite book of his and the one I felt would be most relevant to our sliver of time in a remote cabin on an island off the coast of Downeast Maine.

all photos copyright Casey Barber – please be respectful and don’t use without permission!

We didn’t have a lot to do do on the island but hike to various breathtakingly gorgeous lookouts and summits. And the trails were pretty much always covered with slippery roots and rocks and mosses when we weren’t crunching across a rocky beach, so I had a lot of time for meandering thought as I tried not to sprain an ankle.

So I wrote haiku in my head, repeating them to myself on the trails until I could transcribe them into my Field Notes notebook whenever I had a moment.

These are haiku in the Kerouac-ian sense, in that they don’t always conform to the traditional 5-7-5 syllable structure. As the Living Haiku Anthology quotes him:

“Above all, a haiku must be very simple and free of all poetic trickery and make a little picture and yet be as airy and graceful as a Vivaldi pastorella.”

Go ahead and read a ridiculously long compilation of Kerouac’s haiku when you have some free time to noodle, and read mine below.

Casey’s Isle au Haut Haiku

Night at the cabin
Toes burrowed in my napsack
I’m a cold sardine

James Taylor nailed it
Thinking about women
And glasses of beer

Green shiny snake on the trail
Like an emerald necklace
That wiggles

Tiny pine tree
Growing outta a stump
King of his own mountain

Walking past a lone house
The smell of breakfast
Frying at 7 am

Five dogs greeting me on the road
The pit stop crew
I didn’t know I needed

I’ve written more about our adventures on Isle au Haut in my book Maine Ingredients, which details my time as an artist-in-residence in Acadia National Park with illustrated essays and recipes. In the book, you’ll also get my recipe for fiddlehead fritti, inspired by the wild greenery of the island.

Learn more about my artist residency and Maine Ingredients here.

1. This is a whole other story about the irony of how I read this epiphany-inducing book under the despised gaze of my most hated teacher ever. I still have a grudge against her, actually. Maybe someday I will write it all out. ↩︎