Tag Archives: poem about an elephant

Panegyric for Pachyderm: NaPoWriMo 2022, Day 11

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Panegyric for Pachyderm

Which one among us says I can’t
eulogize an elephant?
Oh thou of ears floppily gray,
of thee I have so much to say.

Words invented will not do.
I have to coin new words for you.
Your skin, in fact, is so abundant
that I must call you epibundant.

And other words unbunkable?
Tuskidopherous and trunkable.
Unchallenged monarch of the zoo,
parades aren’t complete without you.

Your trumpet fills the savanna air
to tell the world that you are there.
Rip Van Wrinkle might better name
thee, monarch of the great untame!

And though by any other term,
loxodonta or pachyderm,
we do not know thee quite as well.
in size and fame, you still excel.

 

For NaPoWriMo Day 11, we are to write a poem about a very large thing. And yes, that is me on the back of that elephant!

“Ant”cestry.Com

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“Ant”cestry.Com

“I think we may be family,” was whispered in his ear,
but he couldn’t see who said it, though he looked both far and near.
Again that small voice spoke to him. “We share a family name,
although as the biggest, you possess most of the fame.”

Thus did the massive elephant notice for the first time
the tiniest of animals who’d finished its long climb
from the dirt so far below up to his mighty ear.
From foot to knee to shoulder, it had climbed in spite of fear

that one great flinch might cast it from the air down to the ground.
Yet still it journeyed upwards, driven to expound
on how great an irony, surely it must be,
that this small “ant” and the eleph”ant” must be family!

NaPoWriMo 2018, Day 9: write a poem in which something big and something small come together.

Adventures with Animals in my Careless Youth

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“No, no, no,” I said, “I can’t”
ride upon that elephant.
The creature lowered to one knee,
leg bent to make a step for me,
and seconds later, I was in air.
Was it courage or a dare?

Each  leg gripped on a massive shoulder,
balanced on that giant boulder
of a back, somewhat nonplussed
as his handler swore and  cussed
to not take down that massive tree
so long as he was bearing me!

Whereupon, once told “You can’t,”
this timber-working elephant
turned to descend the river bank.
I gave the rope a mighty yank.
(That was all I had to hold
as this leviathan grew bold,

intent on giving me a bath.)
His trainer ran to bar his path
and none to soon, in my opinion,
relieved this mammoth of his minion.
Soon after we had said adieu,
I faced adventures that were new.

It’s hard to see what I had there
around my neck, beneath my hair.
That snake wrapped loosely around me
hung writhing down below my knee.
I blew the pungi, hoping harm
would be abated by its charm.

What possessed me, I don’t know,
to agree to this viper show.
I wasn’t squeezed, I wasn’t bitten.
The snake was docile as a kitten.
I was a foolish girl back then.
What wild adventures way back when.

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I’m pretty sure this is a python around my neck. I don’t think I would have been foolish enough to drape myself in a cobra, still, his owner had a pungi, which is what snake charmers use, usually to “charm” vipers or cobras. (Actually, it is the motion of the instrument, not its sound that weaves the spell.) I had on a top that was perfect camouflage  for the reptile. Both of these photos were taken in Sri Lanka in 1973.