The Wet Monkey Ll Poem by Morgan Michaels

wearing not a stitch and peered over the palm trees
at the gray sky lit pink by the coming-up sun,
as the birds chattered indifferently. The green walls
of Casa Verde stood on the edge of a rain forest
dark at that hour but livened here and there,
sometime by a orange-yellow flash,
a jungle bird whose name escapes me now
capering the treetops.

The pool dreamed-an aquamarine in a tile bezel
azure water slapping its sides
turbulence with no clear source.
Something told me there was no time to waste;
Wrapping myself in the sheet, I raced downstairs
into the yard, over the wet grass
and through the picket gate to the pool's edge
where the cause of the noise became clear.

An intrepid monkey-foolish and young-hoping to cop a drink
had tumbled into the spill
Now monkeys can't swim-don't ask why, it's true:
that's why you've never seen one doing the crawl.
Arboreal, maybe they don't care to learn.
In any case, this one, true to type, couldn't.
As kids we were taught to be monkey-wary
they're not friendly and carry disease.
But here was a monkey....