What It Is And What It Isn’t

For example, I don’t think it’s the monkey
we saw masturbating up a tree
the day we snuck off to the zoo,
though he had that slightly love-struck look,
with his cheesy grin and glazed saucer eyes.

It’s nothing quite so undemanding.

I think it’s more like the devious orchid
that lures an insect
onto its soft scented dripping lips,
then hammers it against the stamen,
then hammers it again and again,
and again,

till the battered bug stumbles,
not knowing what hit it,
from what it thought was a warm place to stop
and copulate, stunned by cunning,
back into the real world,

dazed and
probably none the wiser.