Honku: The Zen Antidote to Road Rage

by Aaron Naparstek

How many times this week has your morning commute, or just plain driving to the grocery store, turned into a road-rage-inducing nightmare? A soccer mom steals your parking spot. A cell-phone guy cuts you off on the freeway. A student driver nearly rear-ends you at the mall. Take heart. The Zen Antidote to Road Rage is all you need to lower your blood pressure and make you forget that jerk in the yellow SUV.

A collection of more than one hundred very funny haiku (or honku), this book shines its brights on the dark side of America’s car culture. Distilling the daily horrors of driving, parking, and ordering from the drive-through into a time-honored and respected verse form, Honku transforms annoying moments behind the wheel into the stuff of poetry and will leave you in a state of enlightenment and bliss. Well, at the very least it’ll make you laugh.

A diverting read that may inspire you to pen your own haiku, Honku is the perfect fit for the glove compartment, to be pored over while you’re stalled in traffic on the interstate.

Genres: Poetry

128 pages, Hardcover

First published June 3, 2003

Reviews

[notgettingenough]

I can't see this book
Fixing my every day rage
At cars and their noise

but still....I'll try

https://www.npr.org/templates/story/s...

[Deb (Readerbuzz) Nance · Rating 3 out of 5]

Comments: Houston's 610 Loop
at rush hour: Sadly, even
Gandhi might falter.

Ah! My first honku! And what, you might ask, is a honku? Well, a honku is "the Zen antidote to road rage,
a little haiku written to release anger at the automotive world". And I do feel a quiet sense of happiness upon
completing this honku, a feeling of striking back, however gently, at the crazed world of the car and driver.

My favorite from the book:

I let you over
now where is my thank-you wave?
Honda Uncivic

[Katherine Hague · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loved this little book of road rage inspired haikus :) put a big smile on my face

[Naomi · Rating 5 out of 5]

very funny. this is a haiku book that is best for the bathroom or when you're on a roadtrip.

[Colin Kemmis]

Funny and poignant.

[Don · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great book of Haiku written with the theme of road rage. this'll go good under the tree of a buddy of mine that has that problem.

[Megan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really poignant stuff...like this.

I saw that finger!
yes, you in the Intrepid -
we shall meet again