Ramapithecus and I

The young swamp he came to

Six million years ago,

His unfazed mother beside him,

His father recently dead,

Is the wall-map’s mixed forest,

A dotted power line along its edge,

And the window’s low, clouded hills,

Dolomite and fossil rich.

Making his home

Where his implements took him,

He waited for the rains to break.

Cutting my finger, it’s his blood I taste.