10 MONTHS

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image above: fisheye view of Mars

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Gold Fish by Gustav Klimt

This haiku is about flash fiction and hyperbole. Ernest Hemingway, purportedly to settle a bar bet as to how short a story could be, wrote this one-sentence fiction:  "For sale: baby shoes, never worn."  Although more than six words, this haiku attempts something similar, to conjure (in seventeen syllables, nineteen with title) the one-sided fallout of a relationship’s aftermath.  But hopefully this haiku also gets to the human weakness of hyperbole.  Imagine two brothers who carpool, X and Y.  X says he wants to depart at noon and will leave by 12:15pm.  Next day, X waits until leaving at 12:17pm.  Two minutes later, at 12:19pm, Y arrives and gnashes his teeth. Both brothers plead their case to a third party (think brother number three, Z).  Y halves the facts: he was there "under ten minutes late or so."  X doubles the numbers, stating that he waited just about 30 minutes, twice the grace period promised.   Z knows both accounts cannot be true; both X and Y are staking extremes, both secretly meaning that they mean the mean. What is worst is the inevitable result of two exaggerators knowingly exaggerating while they argue against exaggeration. At this point, fair play is surrendered. The prize becomes winning the ruling of the judge. Having been X, Y and Z at various times, I feel bad for all parties, but X saddens me most.  The straight facts are his.  Why forfeit truth? Why trade an already clean account for a slightly more sympathetic false one? But it is a temptation we’ve all faced. Does this haiku mean something different to you? Contact me!

Which she described to

friends, then next boyfriends, as close

to more than a year.