Today, our tenth annual Haiku Challenge (if you like, you can check out past years for inspiration). We're also happy to include other forms of poetry if haiku don't inspire you. Have a perfume-related limerick or a sonnet you'd like to share? Please do.
If you're writing a haiku, pick a perfume or a perfume house (or really, anything related to perfume), and write a haiku about it. Use the simplified English form — your haiku should have three lines, the first line with five syllables, the second line with seven syllables and the third line with five syllables. You can put the perfume name in the title if that makes it easier, and at any rate, don’t stress over the rules of traditional haiku — this is just for fun.
Note: top image is detail from The Amida Falls in the Far Reaches of the Kisokaidō Road (Kisoji no oku Amida-ga-taki), from the series A Tour of Waterfalls in Various Provinces (Shokoku taki meguri) by Katsushika Hokusai, ca 1827, via the The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Last year I wrote three haiku on tuberose scents, this year I am upping my game with four haiku dedicated to rose scents. 🙂 The names of the scents are at the bottom.
1
Rose mixed with grapefruit
Dances in a champagne glass
So fresh and fizzy.
2
This rose shines and burns
With hyacinth and resins,
Piercing the shadows.
3
A bee is drinking
Sweet nectar of blooming rose
Perfect day in June.
4
Magnificent rose
From green stem to lush petals
Bow down to the queen!
1 Les Liquides Imaginaires Dom Rosa
2 Guerlain Nahema
3 Robert Piguet Rose Perfection
4 Serge Lutens Sa majeste la rose
Oh my goodness, Glannys, these are just lovely!
Love them all especially number one!
Thank you!
Love your #1!
Thanks, #1 seems to be popular. 🙂
Wonderful job, Glannys!
Thank you!
#1 is awesome and I love Dom Rosa
Dom Rosa is awesome!
Well done Glannys!
Thanks!
Fantastic!
Thank you! Glad you like it.
Oh my, so impressed! I’m throwing some love at #2!
Thanks! #2 was the hardest to write.
I like # 3 the most! I think haiku often uses strong nature imagery so I like the image of the bee drinking.
And in this case the image just came into my head – a natural association with this scent.
Found Hermes coffret
Looking for Daim Blonde Lutens
Must organize soon
Super!???
Perfect ?
Hilarious. Love it.
I didn’t know Hermes had a perfume called Coffret ?
Great Haiku??
Good memory lillyjo ! Brava !
It’s hard to forget such a epic customer service fail! I’m still holding a grudge on your behalf ?
a haiku about my scent of the day: (can you guess it?)
sweet sour burst of juice
you strange thing of passionfruit
a daring delight
a haiku about mitsouko:
warm fuzzy lady
lost in her books and pleasures
bring her oakmoss please
a poem about anubis because these syllables are too complicated:
sienna scented covers
scorched desert scorched leathers
waking in her golden tomb
Could it be Arielle Shoshana (aka. Saturday?)
it is!!! felt appropriate to wear saturday on a saturday 🙂
Very suiting.
Oh my gosh, I love all three that you wrote. I especially love “bring her Oakmoss please.”
This!
It was a good haiku: I guessed your perfume from it! 🙂
Excellent!
Haiku for iris:
Queen of underground
Buried waiting for greatness
The most precious root
Haiku for my sotd: Etruscan Water by Francesca Bianchi
Moss is the essence
Chanelling Dior Eau Sauvage
Only vintage one
Love the iris one!
Love the iris one!
iris is an ingredient i’m still trying to figure out my feelings about but i loveeee your poem (and i love the last line of your second haiku!)
Love your iris haiku!
Thank you all, I’m happy you like it 🙂
The iris one’s really good!
Liked your iris haiku. Can’t fully appreciate the other one since I’m not familiar with the scent.
There was a young girl from Nantucket
Looking for deals, said “I struck it!”
Found a sale that was hot
And now she has got
Summer cologne by the bucket
…yah, so I’m not young nor from Nantucket, but I did a belly-flop off the no-buy wagon yesterday.
See, I found these 4711’s for a very nice price. So I clicked ‘buy’… and THEN I processed the size. !!!! 170 mls !!!! each !!!! WHAT HAVE I DONE?!!
What I bought was:
– 4711 Pink Pepper & Grapefruit
– 4711 Myrrh & Kumquat
– 4711 Lime & Nutmeg
– 4711 Mandarine & Cardamom
Anybody want some? I am thinking of offering 30ml splits for $10-11 each, with heavily discounted shipping if you get more than one. No need to make a commitment now, I’m just seeing if there’s interest… if there is, I’ll buy some 30ml bottles and make it more official next week.
Oy. Read the size more carefully next time, me!
“I did a belly-flop off the no-buy wagon!” I am giggling so hard over here.
Great limerick! 😀
I’d be interested in all of those splits – hard to choose just one!
this is silly and delightful! congrats on the deal score – i’m very tempted by a split even though i know nothing about any of these scents (please report on them??)
I’d be game for some splitting.
Love limericks! Well done.
I’m all about the limericks,too. ?
Pixel! You can truly bathe in it. Love the limerick.
Your limerick made me smile, and everything else made me giggle! Always down for a split 🙂
So funny! It’s amazing how hard it is to tell sizes from pictures on the internet. I, sadly, have made the OPPOSITE mistake, and couldn’t believe what an incredible deal I was getting on that vintage Bel Ami…. turned out to be a mini (but still worth it!)
See, I have a bottle of 4711 Coffee Bean & Vetyver. It’s 50 ml. So in my tiny mind, all bottles of 4711 x & y are 50 ml. Right? You would think that at some point while I was picking out not one but four bottles of 4711, the ‘5.7 ounce’ size might have registered with me. Nope, nope, nope. So now I have 4711 doorstops, enough for the whole house.
Aw, Pixel, don’t get too down on yourself. You were just cruising along in shopping mode. I’ve cruised along in shopping mode many, many times and gotten various things that weren’t exactly what I was expecting. I’m saying that I can empathize.
Although it is funny that you got enough cologne to bathe in. 🙂 Okay, it’s one of the things that’s funny when it happens to other people, not to yourself. Sorry!
How witty, Pixel
H-Y-S-T-E-R-I-C-A-L !!!!!!!!!!!!
“There once was a man from Nantucket. . . ” has never ended so well, or so fragrantly! Enjoy the bounty.
Everything about this post is delightful! It might not be worth your while to do 10-mL splits, but if you are willing to put in the work, and if my no-buy wraps up before splitting time (I was on track for my no-buy to end on Wednesday, but then I went to a party yesterday and ruined EVERYTHING; my no-buy will now end next Sunday at the EARLIEST), I’d be interested in 10 mL of each.
Rest assured, I think I will have plenty to spare whenever your no-buy ends. Even if that’s 10 years from now 🙂
Hahaha excellent point 🙂
(In all fairness, who even thinks of 5.7 oz as being a reasonable perfume size?)
I’d be interested in some smaller decants — like 10 ml or 20 ml, if it would be worth it for you to do a split that size. We can discuss.
Thanks!
Umm, yeah, what SheriG said! I’d be interested in all of these. Thanks for sharing your bounty!
I’ll start plotting how to make room in my fridge….
Scrambling through samples
Community project time
Knowing there’s a match
Yes!
Great!
So true! 🙂
Happy Mother’s Day weekend
White Chocolate
Not my FIL chai tea
Discontinued Omnia
Why *don’t* we have a perfume that is your FIL chai??
SOTM is Prada L’Eau Ambrée from a recent swap. It’s nice – I wasn’t sure at first, but it’s definitely growing on me.
Everyone’s haikus are so good – I got nuthin’.
I’m right there with you.
I think it will keep growing on you, Sheri.
2nd that. It’s a sleeper.
Not really a haiku person, will have to think about it some more. In the meantime, I’m wearing Lancôme Parfait de Roses.
I’ve been so curious about this one as I love Jasmins Marzipane, one of my latest purchases.
I am not a haiku person either! And I can’t remember how I came up with this idea in the first place (or maybe someone else did?) but I love reading them every year.
SOTD is Havana Vanille
I am not good with haiku…here goes mine
Smoke without smoking
She leans over the boats rail
The Mekong flows by
Oh but that’s lovely 🙂
It really is! Apsara, you *are* good with haiku.
thank you!
so many lovely ones today!
All you haiku writers: well done!
Not even attempting it here. SOTD: Olympic Orchids Seattle Chocolate. My sample set is going to go a long way. No weak juice, that.
I love that house! Haven’t smelled Seattle Chocolate but I love her Cafe V, Carolina, and Woodcut. She does great work.
I love Seattle Chocolate. I mean, actual chocolate from that brand, I haven’t tried the perfume.
LightGray got me hooked on these!
-Bvlgari Black-
A slice of rubber
Reduced to pure spring water
Refreshing mock mist
-Lamplight Penance-
A pensive whaler
Far from home, the boat’s walls creak
Updating ledgers
-Bloodflower-
Cold latex nectar
Dripping from the thick pistil
Of no Earth flower
Oh very nice! You really got into your scenes.
Agreed, the imagery is beautiful!
Very good!
Those are all terrific–very striking that last one.
Have no idea what is Lamplight Penance– but based on your poem I am in!
There once was a fragrance named, #5.
A classic, yet noses kept wanting to change it, at least, try,
They fiddled and they faddled; they needled and they jabbled.
Despite all the changes, #5 continues to thrive.
Ok. Not exactly a great one.
There once was a stench like an armpit.
Whose aroma grew riper by the minute.
With fingers pointed at me
I was left blaming the Yorkie
O! The magnificence of air with Patchouli in it!
For the record, I cannot wear #5. And I love patchouli.
I recently rediscovered eBay. Beyond stunned at what the prices are. Some are extremely high and some so low.
I bought a fragrance and think I got scammed. I have another bottle, so I can see the difference, but I take really good care of my perfumes.
I’m realizing I don’t NEED everything. As I change dinner plans to hunt down discontinued perfume. ?
The patch one really made me laugh!
Mauve and white shower
lilacs, sweet heralds of spring
Their scent in the breeze
Vacances, Jean Patou.
Love it!
Thank you Calypso, Vacances is like that to me.
Lovely. The blooming lilacs are so inspirational.
It’s such a special moment isn’t it, quite short but so vivid.
Loved the haiku! Do you mind if I use it (with the proper attribution, of course) in my upcoming post about lilacs perfumes?
Undina, of course, I feel flattered, thank you so much.
Lovely, Aurora!
Thank you Lillyjo, I think so many of us love lilacs.
Bravo!
Thank you so much Oakland Fresca, lilac blooming time is so anticipated and alas so short.
Orange blossom, sea, heat
They say “smells like Malibu”
Husband says “yowza!”
Las Flores by Provision Scents
Hopefully, it’s “Yowza! Come sit next to me.”
Yep, that’s the yowza! He’s a big fan.
Can I cover up
The smell of baby vomit
With a French perfume?
“Scent of the Day”
Happy Mother’s Day weekend!
Lol you’re asking the real questions now.
That’s deep!
Love this. ? happy Mother’s Day!
Super cute! Happy Mother’s Day!
Bravo! 🙂
Now speechless again
All of these Haiku are great
But yours takes the cake
🙂 🙂 🙂
Of course you can.
My friend, Vanilla!
So much comfort from your wafts,
What the world needs now.
I am sniffing some Luckyscent samples today: Olfactive Studio Vanilla Shot, Nobile 1942 La Danza Delle Libellule, Shay & Blue White Peaches and Byredo Sundazed.
I get hay from VS, apple from LDDL, peach unsurprisingly from WP and fabric softener from the Byredo. All in a day’s work. 🙂
Someone else mentioned White Peaches the other day, so I was thinking of sampling it. Is it just straight up peach to you? Do you enjoy it?
It smells like fruity, floral peach to me…hard to break out specific notes. It is quite sweet which makes it somewhat cloying to my nose…says the fickle woman found of super-sweet vanillas. 😉 I am happy to send it on to you for sampling. I have several samples and even a stray decant or two to rehome if you’re interested. 🙂
That’s very kind of you. I’m interested! I’m sure I have things to send along too. I’ll email you tomorrow. 🙂
Vanilla hay (coumarin?) sounds good.
I so agree that vanilla is comforting….
Maybe or perhaps coriander I am thinking looking at the notes now…I am not a hay person. It is not cinnamon-y which is what I infer coumarin should smell like when I looked it up. Vanilla is wonderfully comforting…it sounds dramatic 😉 but I don’t know what I would have done without my arsenal of vanilla perfumes the last few months…good for what ails you/me. 🙂
T-Rex
Bladed mouth opens…
Mesmerized by smoky reek,
I walk into bliss.
Your haiku is so cute, I love it! Good to know about that smoky note, I’m sure it’s a fabulous scent.
wonderful, Calypso!
Lovely, that makes me want to try T-Rex and I love the word bliss, so evocative.
Thats a good one!
Your imagery is so good!
Neroli Dore
Radiance epitomized
You sparkle and shine
Moon Bloom on my skin
Coconut and tuberose
Rise with the day’s heat
Both are great, but I especially like one about Neroli Dore. Well done!
Thanks! They were my SOTD options, and I ended up picking Neroli Dore.
Like your #1! ?
Thank you! I almost finished off my decant of ND today. It was a hot day, so I used a lot and reapplied. I’m glad I have a travel spray from the swap meet to use next!
Absolutely lovely.
“Radiance epitomized” is especially brilliant!
Sweet fruit wafting near,
Damp dirt, smooth stone, green caverns,
Mesmerized by Bat.
Very nice! I think you captured Bat well.
Thank you!
I love the haiku challenge, it’s another reminder how wonderful everyone is here!
I don’t have one, but I’ve been rapidly switching fragrances this week to combat the stress of my thesis defense on Tuesday. I’m excited, but also dousing myself in all my expensive scents (currently Jacaranda by Naturalizations Brasil).
Hemabelle, Tuesday — I bet you are excited!
Good luck Hemabelle! You will do great!
Good luck to you!
I’m sure you will do very well, and will smell lovely.
I have never been good with any type of poetry writing in any language but it’s not a reason not to participate, right?
An acrostic haiku that describes my morning:
Not an easy choice
Silver Iris or Hiris
The cat demands food
And just because:
Scent Of The Day thread
Serge Lutens, Chanel, Guerlain
Then commuter woes
Well done!
Both are great!
How clever!
What is this I wear?
Unlabeled sample, rosy
Honey’d mystery
Nice, and so true of those mystery samples we always find and wish we could identify!
Horses and leather
sweet candy and musky sweat
Come watch the circus!
So what am i wearing today?
Dzing!?
Yes ???
Happy mother’s day to all celebrating today! I am so grateful to have my mother still with me and a new furry baby to love. Life is good. Wearing Mon Précieux Nectar.
And a belated happy mother’s day to you! Enjoy your new baby 🙂
Only one this year!
Paris-Dauville
was a trip I had never
expected to adore.
This Chanel frag is growing on me… I haven´t felt this way for a new frag in years. *blush* 🙂
I love this one too. It’s just so good, from start to finish. 🙂
I’ve also been enjoying this one!
Happy Mother’s Day!
Here are some silly Haikus:
Not For Me
My problem with gourmands
Never good enough to eat
Should never be worn.
Fashion Icon Is Still Laughing At Us
Yes, Coco did say
You should not smell like a rose
But it was a joke.
The Nature Of My Financial Foibles
A perfume taunts me,
Let’s just have a little fun,
My wallet be damned.
Ha! Pretty good stuff there?
Happy Mother’s day to you?
“My wallet be damned.” Yep!
‘Silly’ maybe but profund nonetheless, I bet you’re right about No 2.
Sotd Rose Ikebana. I forget how lovely this is! So bright and fresh even hours after spritzed.
Also highly recommending Jo Malone Tomato leaf candle to all fans of Hermes / Jean Claude Elena. If this were a perfume I would likely be my favorite JM.
Happy Mother’s Day!
I like Rose Ikebana too, and also forget how much in between times I wear it.
Just put my garlic pork roast in the oven after spending most of the morning cleaning. Now it’s off to take a shower and then put on Tigress Musk and relax.
Sounds delicious!
Happy mother’s day to all!
Testing Montale Intense Cafe for the second time. Worthy of a decant. Didn’t wow me the first time, but really enjoying it today.
Making coffee before I had out for a spot of kayaking. Beautiful sunny day.
Check ScentBird: I think they had that perfume, so for $14.95 (or less if you find one of the coupons that float around) you can get 8 ml including S&H.
Saturday:
a tire rolls by
tips tea cup, scrapes the brown bean
softer than it looks
Sunday:
floating, soft green clouds
fresh leaves cool the summer warmth
an elegant grin
Same house, very different scents!
I’m not a poet, but I glanced through some of the comments from Saturday. There are very clever poems in there, folks! 🙂
I’ve been wearing Assam of India. (Insert tea haiku here) That was a sample Rayleighblue sent me. (Thank you!) I ended up getting the Berdoues “Grand Cru” sampler set and the 7 Virtues sampler set. That got here yesterday. I’ll keep you posted as I try them. 🙂
Since I saw someone’s comment about LUSH having many, many sorts of bath bombs available, I’ve been wanting to go to the LUSH store in King of Prussia. Any folks who live locally want to travel east with me? I don’t have a specific day in mind, just an “I would like to see 50+ sorts of bath bombs” sort of thought. Like, just to say I’ve seen it.
Neyronrose, late reply but I will meet you at Lush King of Prussia! And there are lots of others in the area, we can try to get a group if you want.
That sounds like fun! 🙂 I was hoping I could meet up with someone or someones in Exton and carpool. I don’t mind driving to King of Prussia when it’s not rush hour, but I like having other people around to help me remember where I left my car! (lol) I don’t have any appointments here that I need to get to for the rest of this week.
I’m neyronrose at gmail dot com
Thanks!
A kingdom of trees
Enveloping emerald
Arbole my love
The answer is pretty obvious I think!
Arbole Arbole for the win!
Of course 🙂
why won’t Chanel let
online decanters sell their
fragrances, it’s sad