from _Fragmentary Ekphrases Based On Paintings Made By Monkeys_

[Red and brown acrylic; by Lady, a chimpanzee]


…telluric disturbance, or
          tidal crash, if
earth were water,
    but it isn’t, or it wasn’t,
       but the vigor
of the gesture
   flowed
       moltenly,
magnanimously like
              magma,
  a tower of a torrent
          that turned
the tables
             nearly inside-out,
that imagined
        in the mirage
the
      red image of
our mired age, ladies
  and gentlemen,
       flip up your trays
          and
  keep your seats
upright:
          this is the sound of
  an emulsion
cracking,
the
snapshot
     of a
            chthonic boom