As Though Gibraltar

As though Gibraltar came shouldering roughly up
out of the boisterous sea, making a strait for Hercules
and turning unsuspecting beach to inland Spain,
and I, an ignorant Barbary Macaque, 
went scrambling over that unimagined immensity
still draining ocean from its rocky face,
as though it were already ancient home to me;
this is how we should make our lives' foundation,
so that when our fortunes fail
the ponderous bulk of all that world 
will come roaring up from under, 
thundering loudly of its strength 
and heaving granite cliffs into the sun
for us to groom each others' fur on.

August 17 2011