HEY YOU, BIG APE

Hey you, big ape
   with a big bouncy sunshine,
   broad shoulders and a big
   bald head,
Your bloated belly bursting
   in bulimic bliss,
   bless your boorish ways
   and your patriotic blackouts,
   brainless pleasures is all you need,
Stand up, big ape, and flex your
   biceps for the big America,
   bigger and better than ever,
Blow up your face across the
   black and white television
   screen, blasting off into
   the outer space
   of baboons and pepsi commercials,
Stand up like a blissful balloon
   in the world of anorexia
   nervosa, lupus erythematosus,
   and some such other mucosa,
Bring out the blasted mongoose
   out of the intranasal epithelium
   of basal cell ganglia,
Break this universe of amoeba
   consciousness and degenerate
   professionalism and
Cover it all with a giant mucous
   membrane of Moby Dick,
We are all dermatology experts
   when it comes to examining
   the nature of our leather,
Go on a food binge like
   an overfed antelope and
   phagocytotic mitochondrion,
floating, bloating in the
   upper limits of Higher Stratosphere,
Incubating the ozone layers
   of our multi-bodied ecosystem,
Sniffing glue and reading pornographic
   literature or National Geographic--
It's all the same thing among us
   amphibians,
Ribbit, ribbit, ribbit,
   like desperate toads, frogs and
   crocodiles,
We eat the eggs of our young,
   searching forever for that slimy
   dollar,
There is no frugality in air pollution,
And there is no escape from the
   chicken coop,
Rejoice, big bad baboon,
For your time has come to rise
   bigger and bigger,
To fly those friendly skies
   of bizarre Spanish airlines,
And there is no time to hide
   the eggs and the French toast,
Building growing faster than people,
And nature short-changed us with
   defective genes,
So stand up you, elephants of tomorrow,
For there is no more time for waiting,
We are the future generation,
There is no use fighting progress,
   so catch the wave, catch the wave,
Rhythmically floating in the ocean
    of ennui,
Underwear and all,
   pointing fingers at the Tree of Madness,
   madness, madness, madness like
A thousand crystals spread out over a
   woman's breast
In a wondrous miracle of science,
Change your hair follicles and recombine
   your DNA and RNA molecules
With an electricity of spontaneous
   combustion of the Ford Motor Company,
Climb up the stairs of quintessential
   buffoonery, bleeding death through
The intensity of your corners,
Rainbow kaleidoscopes of madness
   sending shivers through your hollow
        spines,
Reducing everything to its absurd
    components,
Saying nothing and signifying nothing.

                                                    March 4, 1987
                                                 --Alexander Shaumyan