THE OLD APE MAN AND I

The other day a simian friend said to me at the zoo,
"God’s hand shook when he made me,
Was it steady when He made you?"

I thought of the many answers this question could support,
And chose the one less likely to give my old friend sad hurt.
"God’s hand was most steady when He made the species
That begat you and me,
And we both lost the Godly Touch
When we left Eden’s Land,
You to your tall, misty mountains,
My ways to another strand.

My ape friend said, "My eyes are weary,
Will you permit me to rest my head
Upon your shoulder?" "Of course," I said.

So rest with another species as we both did that day,
And feel the God Force in your veins
And in each other’s touch.

And then hearken with silence to the infinity of life
That priests and popes and parsons
Have searched for 2,000 years now gone,
Whose Holy Mother Churches
Are at best great piles of stone.

These were the thoughts I gave the old man
Lost from his misty home.
I felt his head upon my breast,
Heard his contented sighs,
And looked out across his cage’d zoo,
Poor crumb for Paradise.

And then a strange phenomenon:
I was thrust back aeons to Paradise
When the old man hefted my chin,
And I saw God look out at me
From my old ape friend’s eyes.

George W. Martin