Country Haiku winner

The big day is here, the Sony/Salon Country Haiku contest is over, and it's time to announce the winner of the CD prize pack and the Sony Dream Station. We got thousands of submissions, and while a frightening percentage of them were about loss of wife, dog and truck (and those got old very quickly), there were heaps of creative, witty submissions, many more than we can print here. But before we announce the winner, here's another selection of our favorites.

From Linda Sands:

I love country songs
they don't gloss over the truth
and most words do rhyme

From Julie Jackson:

she can keep the house
the guns, the dog, the pickup
the Dream System's mine

Fred Wickham:

No more Mozart, mom.
Play some country or I'll keep
kicking 'til I'm born.

Paul DesCombaz (the favorite entry of our inner music nerd):

Alt-Country diehards
crying for their lost savior
Tweedy bought Pet Sounds

Many of the best submissions were, perhaps not surprisingly, very anti-country music, or at least anti-modern country music.

From John DeCock:

Hank spins in his grave
As Toby sings cloying, ersatz
Patriotic screeds

Brad Dimock:

the overwrought twang
booze and broads, tough guy losers
country pains my ears

Tarleton Gillespie:

Production values
Killed country's dusty boots heart
It's Shanias fault

We must make special mention of Les Visible, who bombarded us with nearly 30 vitriolic submissions, among them:

Country music sucks
Like Paris Hilton blowing
Ronald Reagan's corpse

How many lies must
Country music tell before
It sleeps in the sea

But I guess we're just a bunch of softies at heart, because our winning entry, from Kyle Foreman, is a model of sweetness and simplicity, acknowledging the haters, but beatifically sweeping them aside:

Though country music
May not be for everyone
I know no other