In-Between #9 - Neil Ellman

Apocalypse Zoo

So, you see,

there are no elephants

not a one

nor giraffes

nor rhinoceri

(perhaps one in an

almost empty zoo

in Tokyo

where its arthritic legs

are plaster-wrapped

and old men

fight the chimps

for scraps of food)

nor gazelles

and wildebeests

and lions

and hippopotami

nor

for that matter cows

(except for the one

wandering the streets

of a Texas town

where it was born

and surely die

alone)

mooing at the moon

no longer there

Biography: A retired educator,Neil Ellman lives and writes in New Jersey. His poems have been published in numerous journals throughout the world, from Australia to Nepal to Zimbabwe. He has visited the first but not the last two.