Chimpanzees
We are chimpanzees. Wellsuited,
we hoot, hunt down weaklings;
shrieking, beating our chests
at the tearing off of flesh.
We know not what goes on in
the farside of the wood.
Nevertheless, we bless our
alpha male for each death thud
and the blood in our nostrils.
We are not bonobos. Lazily naked,
they flakeout in embrace, while
we chimps race eachother, elbows
and snarls pursuing first place.
We are bigboned, tinybrained;
inflamed in a second, we are
wrecking the trees
and everything in them.
One small spark
is all we require,
as we sit in the scrub,
playing with fire.
Harry Gallagher‘s last collection Northern Lights (Stairwell Books 2017) will be followed soon by Running Parallel (Black Light Engine Room Press), co-authored with BLER editor p.a.morbid. Harry runs the north east stanza of the Poetry Society. www.harrygallagherpoet.