To The Zoo Poem by Ben Gieske

When my life felt not quite right
I was want to lope to the zoo,
Drown myself in animal voices
And all of Nature’s noises.

Somersault with monkey antics,
Insulated from inner city panic,
All of God’s creatures bubbling me up
As I sipped cauling my 7 up.

The alligators were quilt-plaited in sleep
Floaters of dreams in their pool so cool
With not one-eyed notice of this fool,
No bad dreams with any reasons to weep.

The coyotes muzzled up in their den,
The elephants trumping out company too.
The zebras shimmering flaps of black and white.
I got a wink, I think, from the cockatoo.

The otters jack and jilled.
The seals stole special appeal.
The monkeys took turns hunting fleas
Like neighbor to neighbor sharing good deeds.

How good natured they all were
Bundled up in pastel furs
except for the panther
who wandered and wondered, so it appeared,
flashing his blackness in streams
side to side from seam to seam.

I too wandered and wondered
Splashed by the loon crying in the lagoon
How much from nature, God’s evolving book,
Man has ripped, scripted, and took
Just for us to take a look.

I needed not turn my eyes high
To glimpse some birds flying free to the sky,
Fluffing off behind with me the why
If there is in nature order
Why we create such disorder.

God’s ways are not always our ways.
If we are animal rationalis
Why then don’t we think
Before we tinker with the world and all of this.

July 28,2006