HUNTER GATHERER
The Serengeti holds the naked man.
Bare body hunched like a pink flamingo
straining water for detritus; evolution’s fallen angel.
The hairless string bean of the animal kingdom.
Opposable thumb, binocular vision; cunning
as a noun going straight for the jugular.
I’ve studied the universe for the billiard game it is.
The slow ricochet of low balls.
The bouncing rhythm of a high ball;
clickety-clack of eternity; eons, milliseconds.
And heard the radio gurgle of a game played out
in constellations to the very end when all balls are sunk.
Side pockets bulging with potential again
and what carbon black is left sticking to God’s fingers
as if it were chewing gum about to be molded into man again.
Author’s Bio
DAN MURPHY is an educator and an author. He has co-authored eleven books in the fields of Environmental Science and Outdoor Eduction. His poetry has appeared in Quills, Canadian Poetry Magazine, Rabbit Tales, Paragon IV, V, VI, Red River Review, The Tilting Expatriate, Fieldstone Review, The Scaldy Detail 2013: An Anthology of New Writing, (Scallta Media, Enniscorthy, Co. Wexford), Crannog 28 (Galway Ireland), The Newfoundland Quarterly, QWERTY, Juxtaprose Literary Magazine, The Mackinac Magazine, to name a few. In 2011 he received a Newfoundland and Labrador Arts and Letters award for poetry and in 2016 was a runner up in the Sparks Literary Festival.