Monkey Training for a Circus
Give the photographers no more
ops like this denatured rhesus monkey
turned tragic clown. Jammed against
a man-made wall, he would fade out
of his overexposed life,
but a chain collars him to a bike;
neck and prop bound in motion’s
tug’o war–he’s screwed
in black and white.
The trainee’s eyes arc beyond the frame
at empty space where the trainer’s cropped
face has gone. Only form looms—a sleeve drips
a taloned hand, the other floats a whip, set
to whale the air, to etch flesh.
Re-versed by life’s circus run
this old world primate’s ancient name
evokes Homeric epic: Thracian King Rhesus,
at Troy, wrapped in gold and silver sleep
and the raider’s night-work ripping away
his sweet life as a nightmare hovered above his head.
The ripped-off rhesus would opt for rainforest gilt–
unruly hand-over-hand, would scale
a braided rope of vined sun to lick silver dew,
then flush with fruit and grubs run the holy wild
alongside Hanuman.
But the nightmare hovers, still.
A muse meant for play
scares
natural light, shutters
an undreamed, human other…..Begin
again at the origin–the first link
forged. See Darwin’s evolution
to closeted primatologist, his descent
to Yerkes National Primate Research Center
where–humans excepted–the quest
grants the vivisector licence.
Grant it, we humans are cagey lovers
of hypotheses, crafters of neutrality
if the white coat suits as canny cover
then self splits from method,
if the modus delivers a cold, hard, corpus
then suffer not when we turn the monkey
into a meta-cog in science’s zeal.
Now switch the mirror self-recognition trial
reflect
as you starve the abject subject to comply,
isolate the rhesus infant in Harlow’s
pit of despair, breed infection–
extract the motherlode antigen.
With end in mind, slice through
spinal nerves, crack skulls open
marvel
at the living brain, marvel too
at the rhesus clone, Tetra;
into her twin artfully breed
the jelly fish gene so under
a giant glazed eye, cells glow
know
your blinding cerebral brilliance.
In the span where city meets jungle
a cropped head spies the bloody line
and feels its way back to body—a gory grace
guides the genome home
as out in space
Albert, the first monkey astronaut licks dew
from a star, as the fugitive EP13
who flew over the cuckoo’s nest beholds
Yerkes in ruins—overgrown, reversed
to wild…..Begin
North Pacific Garbage Gyre
I
Hot equatorial winds spiral, co-mix, currents whirl
whip round the North Pacific Gyre once an ocean dervish
now a concentric garbage swirl
One-hundred million tons, offhand vortex of squashed cups,
crushed bottles, bobbing Ziploc bags, fused six-pack rings,
twisting dolls, balls, Bics, yesterday’s plastic bits
rush downstream, gush non-stop into weeks months years
the collective unconscious glut, caught in river’s junked maw
disgorged into pollution’s Sargasso.
Left to our own ends, refuse all ends where life began
in once-sane waters–on our aqua sea face we pitch
unknown, unseen, afar a new rubbish continent.
II
High noon on too-calm waters
a manmade mantle bars the sun
the autotrophs future darkens, I know
but don’t show me
what Charles Moore sighted
–no more pristine ocean, but a Pacific
vomiting endless plastic–no
don’t show me
reckless freight carriers struck
by the storm’s o’ertaking wings
the candy-coloured crate’s sway and topple
quieten the jetsam
running off with my peace of mind, a tsunami
of unliquidated Nike sneakers, rubber ducks
hockey gloves, socking the brain
don’t show me
sea foam hurling up the aquatic dead
crazy miles of branded bags—salt-thinned
strands that mock jellyfish and poison sea turtles
silence the ocean’s
flotsam roar curling into a death-mute
conch sinking, abysmal, beneath
the whole caboodle–no lifeline
tomorrow I’ll come around
awake from sleep’s ringed underbelly strangling
seabirds and in the wake of sail boats strung
on the horizon, I’ll find myself—missing, at sea
downhill from everything.
III
Work quick—too slow—tight-fisted
incessant hustle; disposable suns
dawn as the world’s poor pull chariots
of cheap goods across the sky.
The World Packaging Organization
takes the on-the go-lifestyle’s compulsive pulse,
graphs the time-poor consumer’s steadfast
unconcern for environmental-cide.
Morning breaks on blister-packed muffins
afternoon pops clamshell containers
housing huge, flavour-looted berries
triple-wrapped evenings muffle trash bins.
Growth scents the air with doublespeak:
recycle, rebuy, regurgitate, remember
there’s opportunity in the breakdown
of the sit-down family dinner
and while families break down
plastic is forever.
