Haiku: The missing piece

Thursday is Nat'l Puzzle Day. About once a year, usually during the winter, I sit down across the span of a few days and peck away at a 500-piece jigsaw puzzle.

A mid-winter meditation.

The last two puzzles, brand new out of the box, were each missing one piece.

Come on.

Of course I couldn't have known there was a missing piece unless it had been a corner or border piece because that's where I always begin. So it wasn't a distraction or a disappointment, until there were no more pieces to place.

But there was a hole, a missing piece. 

I looked on the floor, under my chair, and checked the empty box.

Nope, nowhere to be found. 

It was disappointing not to place that final piece. To have the satisfaction of pressing it into place.

And it left me wondering ...

What now? Do I label the box, "one piece missing?" Seems a rather defeated way for the next puzzler to begin. Or do I leave it as it and let them discover there's a missing piece as I did (setting them up for a similar disappointment), or toss the whole thing into the recycling bin?

I'm puzzled.

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p.s. The stylized haiku above was an interesting writing exercise. It's challenging to figure out how and what to say in the haiku format, to make it work:

3 lines:
1st line = 5 syllables
2nd line = 7 syllables
3rd line - 5 syllables

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It was better not (5 syllables)
to know there was a missing (7 syllables)
piece. Puzzled it out. (5 syllables)

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Traditional haiku often invokes nature, but it can be applied to other subjects as well ... an interesting way to tell a short story.

If you write one, I'd love to read it.