Latin Epidemics
Everyone’s caught this bug, talking to the dead, palms upturned.
Hope, long dead, the naked white bones a comfort; leaving homes,
wives, husbands, dreaming toward love; signs of birth.
People so disciplined, so filled with the rules of grammar; staying
married for life, or at least a day. A good day, kiss-filled; warm,
moist lips, not bloodless, cold & grey. How did we catch the fever?
Dreams uncatchable, passion withers; too much hope, too much
trust. Not much honesty; not much logic; a man wanted his wife
to talk to him. A woman wanted her husband to stroke her cheek
with his finger as if she was a flower, a child wanted her mommy
to drink less, wanted his daddy to stay longer… words come easier,
etched on lead sheets thrown into a sacred spring, asking favors of gods.
May he who stole my dog be plagued with gout; may she who
laughed at my husband grow warts on her nose… in a millennium,
nothing has changed except the curses, the fashion, the cheese & wine.
Kimberly Townsend Palmer 
Insightful, as always.
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