the elephants are caked with mud and tired
and the rhinos don’t move
the zebras are stupid dead stems
and the lions don’t roar
the lions don’t care
the vultures are overfed
the crocodiles don’t move
and there was a strange type of monkey,
I forget the name,
he was on a shelf up there, this male,
he topped the female and worked one off,
finished,
fell on his back and grinned,
and I said to my girlfriend,
let’s go, at last something’s happened.
back at my place we talked about it.
the zoo is a very sad place, I said,
taking my clothes off.
only those 2 monkeys seemed happy, she said,
getting out of her
clothes.
did you see that look on the male monkey’s face?
I asked.
you look just like that afterwards, she
said.
later in the mirror I saw
a strange type of monkey. and
wondered about the giraffes and the
rhinos, and the elephants, especially the
elephants.
we’ll have to go to the zoo
again.
Other works by Charles Bukowski...
