The Wisdom

Suddenly my wife's cheeky,

so reserved and enduring,

with half her face falsified

in a one-sided smirk.

I feel Cleopatra in her left breast

never knew so much as that one pregnant jaw

knows, judging only from appearances.

How certain animals grow

in the shape of their knowledge-

operators of instinct-

is brought home to me:

the canvas duck, the bulb-muscled elephant,

the lone and narrow howling wolf.

The doctor says it will have to come out.

But now she goes around like any giraffe.