Monday, November 20, 2006

At the Zoo

Walking through the zoo
it occurs to me
that lions must prefer prose -

you can tell by the way they yawn,
the growl in their voice,
their fondness for manes.

It is the panthers, sleek and self-contained
in their arboreal hideaways
who are our true poets.

Meanwhile,
the monkeys chatter out
their reviews,

and the professors lie basking in the sun
like crocodiles
or so much dead wood.

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

From a deadwood to the panther: Boo!

Falstaff said...

abi: :-). Me, I'm just a wannabe panther who is training to be deadwood, dabbles his hand at being a monkey and every now and then daydreams of being a lion.

Mr. D said...

Did you write that?? I like. Very much.

Arthur Quiller Couch said...

"The monkeys stand for honesty, giraffes are insincere / and the elephants are kindly but they're dumb.

Orang-outans are sceptical / of changes in their cages / and the zoo-keeper is very fond of rum"

It's been done.
Paul Simon, At the Zoo, Bookends, 1968.

Anonymous said...

What about tigers?

Liked very much, by the way :)

tangled said...

Is it meant to be professors and then crocodiles?

Anonymous said...

I know, this is not the post the comment is about, but just wanted to say that "The Bottle" was one of your best I've read so far.

It was fabulous, moving...liked it very much.


~N.

Anonymous said...

wow this is much more creative than what i wrote about the zoo yesterday :)

Anonymous said...

Very nice.

Falstaff said...

mr. d: Yes, I did. And thanks

AQC: Yes, I know. Hence the title, actually. You'd have to travel far and wide to find S&G songs I haven't heard of.

szerelem: Yes, I thought about putting in tigers, but I didn't want to get into copyright hassles with whatever immortal hand or eye framed their fearful symmetry.

tharunya: how would you tell the difference? Except that I guess crocodiles don't wear elbow patches.

N: thanks. You could just have posted it to the right post, you know.

siri: Thanks

shreemoyee: Thanks