As Grey As Everybody Else… 7.25.2008 Poem by Margaret Alice

One sleepy Nile-crocodile in the swamplands
of her office, floating about between the debris
of her documents; surfing the Internet to check
possible translations of scientific jargon

Dreaming of floating in the Orinoco, far from the
Nile of her birth; wishing for a respite from sitting up
straight in the most un-reptilian fashion, in a bad
imitation of mammalian cortex life-form

Her saurian mind filled with images of dozing off
in lengthwise elongation like all good crocodiles
should, while listening to the eternal song of sun
and wind sighing in freedom, telling of a time

When planet earth will return to pre-civilization
and nature pristine will reign supreme, where
crocodiles and alligators will be free to wander
without limitation, realizing reptilian potential

Without wearing superficial refinement, without
playing charades to hide original ideas, without
norms to force all into conformity, without peer
pressure to be as grey as everybody else…