One thing I’ve learned in the last few months is that the mind, left to its own devices, can wander and dwell on bizarre things.

Haiku 10: Syphilis

(by Kristi Garboushian)

1.

Romantic aside:
Keats’ “La Belle Dame sans Merci,”
blown-glass femme fatale.

Dead rose

2.

Hedonism spawns
creation: le maquillage,
acerbic beauty.

Beneath the skin

3.

Artists, dictators
(brilliant cast of “The Great Pox”),
poets, writers, kings.

Thomas Hardy’s Ale

4.

Voltaire’s Candide smirked.
Syphilis an affliction?
Tout est pour le mieux.

Candide, Voltaire’s famous satire

La Fin.

I’m still obsessed with the syllable, infatuated with the value of these units that make words. It’s strangely soothing.