Americans Are Shooting Elephants Poem by Philip Neilsen

A man fat and flushed as a tallow factory
scowls behind a lion he has shot.
His belly circumnavigates the acacias,
the scrap of a wife's hand on one shoulder.

A blonde girl, cute as a cartridge,
lies smiling beside her collapsed giraffe.

A beauty queen hits it clean.
She sure wiped his dial.

A whole Brady Bunch family squats with
their.585 Gehringers in front of a tusker
who obligingly leaks into the orange soil.

Their grins are aimed exact enough
to make an orthodontist swoon.

Whether smiling or scowling, oh freedom.

There is no punchline.