Vox Populi
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Michael Waters: Chernobyl Necklace
.
Among “countries that are counterfeits of Death,”
Baudelaire in 1846 could not foresee Belarus
Where throats festooned with red crescent scars
Grin across schoolrooms and orphanage wards.
.
Even an aesthete like Gerard de Nerval
Who leashed his lobster for a stroll to the opera
Could not divine this couture of the doomed—
Post-op jewelry where butterfly-shaped
.
Thyroids blackened, then bloomed.
—
Copyright 2015 Michael Waters. First published in Cardinal Points.
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I had to do a bit of research to understand it fully, (despite a PhD in French literature); but, once done, I recognized the genius of the poem. The currents flowed together, beautiful, yet damned, like Baudelaire’s Fleurs du Mal. My heart cries for the children of Belarus.
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