peeling back the husks
finding that every corncob
is riddled with rot
rows and rows of corn
scarecrows working double shifts
even on sunday
The humor of this [the second] is accessible at first reading, but it turns dark on further consideration. Whether we’re talking about small family farms or giant agribusinesses that employ migrant workers, the implications are the same. America’s reliance on corn has led to a situation that exhausts both the labor and the land.
And yet, as good as that is in terms of its social critique, the first haiku is more devastatingly direct.
It takes one or two readings to get past the immediacy of the visual and tactile imagery, but eventually most readers will realize that it isn’t just the corncobs that are “riddled with rot.” The corn is a symbol of the culture that has produced it.
I can’t be certain that this poem was written after Election Day, but I would be willing to bet that it has political overtones.
—Clark Strand