haiQu rule: syllables

5 - 7 - 5, whether in haiQu or haiku or senryu, has never been a rule. it began as a misunderstanding and most contemporary haiku poets know this.

still, in order to be recognizable as a relative of haiku, most haiQu follows the common form of:

short line to open
longer line in the middle
short line to finish

but i have, on occasion, also used:

longer line to open
shorter line
longer line to finish

exceptions and variations are allowed, as long as they don't result in poems that have an absence of similarities to haiku