Haikus by Tian Tian, The National Zoo’s Panda

by Melissa Chiasson

Glass imprisonment

I plumb the depths of despair

Oh look a peanut

 

A man said today

These pandas must be best friends

It’s all a charade

 

Zoo keeper jokes that

I always look tortured. Yes,

But you clean my poop

 

The band En Vogue said

Free your mind and the rest will

Follow. Ah, but when

 

Zoo wants baby, but

What of my dream to become

Poet laureate

 

Endangered species

Wordplay sustains me, as does

Lack of predation