Happiness Epidemic

Without any warning, the disease
sweeps across the country
like a traveling circus.

People who were once blue,
who slouched from carrying
a bag of misery over one shoulder

are now clinically cheerful.
Symptoms include kind gestures,
a bouncy stride, a smile

bigger than a slice of canteloupe.
You pray that you will be infected,
hope a happy germ invades your body

and multiplies, spreading merriment
to all your major organs
like door-to-door Christmas carolers

until the virus finally reaches your heart:
that red house at the end of the block
where your deepest wishes reside,

where a dog howls behind a gate
every time that sorrow
pulls his hearse up the driveway.

--David Hernandez
Copyright © 1999 by Free Lunch Arts Alliance

Other Poets/Other Poems

Kimberly Blaeser, Issue 27

Jared Carter, Issue 24

Billy Collins, Issue 18

Steven Coughlin, Issue 39

Philip Dacey, Issue 6

Stephen Dunn, Issue 34

David Hernandez, Issue 23

Mary Lucina, Issue 26

Cathy Song, Issue 21

R. T. Smith, Issue 38

Charles Harper Webb, Issue 25

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