As a matter of fact...

Our final challenge for the year is to write a poem which engages with a strange and fascinating fact. Fortunately, my mind is somewhat of a treasure trove of oddities. The only trouble is which weird fact to choose...Perhaps something about the Black Death? I taught high school children all about it last year and they were fascinated by the attire worn by doctors during medieval times.

The crow doctors

They hovered over patients;

beaks filled with flowers

drove away the stench of death

The plague blackened blistered skin

which only bad temperaments could bring;

yet the long black robes 

of the crow doctors

kept out the real death bringers

Rats ran riot,

but the crows still came

to let blood 

from victims' veins