Found poetry 3

I've written before about my practice of "finding" haiku on the printed page, and art form that is satisfying to me because it combines visual art with the written word.  I had the chance to use this practice in a challenge project with my local fiber and textile art group.

Seems that one of our members is active in her Friends of the Library group.  Several months ago that group was given 16 large boxes of romance novels, and after disposing of many of them at book sales, simply couldn't even give them away any more.  So the remainder came to our textile art group and we held a challenge to make art out of the books.  Last week we had the great revelation.

I decided to find haiku in the book to make a reader's digest version of the novel, and pasted them into a book I made using various stamps and stencils with acrylic paint. 

Here's the first page, which was also the first page of the book -- you will notice that it didn't take long for our heroine to start losing her clothes.

I won't show you every page, but will give you the full text:

stripped down to her slip
her rented car.  It was hot...
taken a wrong fork


Like a black panther,
energy to stalk his prey.
the danger in him


hard against the bed
his scent... the scent of danger
Why don't you lie down


What are you  hiding?
swept her up against his chest,
muscles of his chest


outrageous passion.
wrapping like satin barbed-wire
her widening thighs


like a scream of pain
She drew a breath on a sob.
Do you even care?


the unspoken pain
she didn't yet comprehend.
A tingling began


Your beautiful skin
creamy velvet all over.
he had studied her


breath caught in her throat
Falling in love at my age
want to marry you,

Lots of fun with this project!   The only drawback was having to read the novels in the first place.  It was kind of like watching a snake eat a bunny rabbit -- so awful that you can't look away.  Do romance writers think that women are attracted to men who treat them like dirt and regard rape as a logical, if frowned-upon, courtship tactic?  Apparently, since they publish over 7,000 romance novels every year.  Even in the readers digest version it would be difficult for me to get through many of them.