Narrated by Richard Stevenson
Illustration by Sue Babcock
Nittaewo, cousin of Teh-Ima,
himself a relative of Orang Pendek –
What the heck! Are all three
cryptid proto pygmies really just
relic populations of Pithecanthropus
Erectus, AKA Homo Erectus, or what?!
Short little humanoid boogers
covered in reddish hair, they have all
ignored roll call, so far; would as soon
pelt us with their dung as mug for
photo ops or hang about any green room
for a candid hominid interest interview.
Nuts to that! Or a greasy banana peel!
We humans just don’t get it. Should slip
and fall on our faces, more often. Yeah,
that’s right. Do a face plant in our forebear’s feces.
Get a good whiff. Finger paint our cribs
with it. Can’t smell any worse than we do
to them. And why all the fuss over a name?
We’re all sons and daughters of some
skookum booger Lucy. She of the sloped forehead
never wed. Just padded about the savannah
in bare feet, huntin’ and gatherin’ nuts in May.
Raggin’ on the old man for better, sharper tools.
What would Lucy do, if his nibs
turned up one day with a Cuisinart
or managed to assemble and program
a flat screen telly or lap top? I betcha
she’d start makin’ a grocery list! Yeah!
Get this… get that… Order a No! No! maybe.
Can’t be scufflin’ about the jungle
in this boring red fox fur. I’ll need highlights —
at the very least, a trim and pedicure!
And don’t be comin’ home expectin’ to get lucky
with all those prickly whiskers. Get a multi-blade
razor and some after shave. When did you last bathe?
I say, get low. Hunker under the snow if need be.
Don’t start drawin’ attention to yourselves
with bricks and mortar – or even igloos.
Hang loose with Rank and Skanky; stay nude
and furry. Don’t be in such an all-fired hurry
to catch up with our sorry tribe of miscreants.
You’ve got it good. No one’s bombed yer ‘hood
or engaged in a drive-by banana pie-ing.
You don’t have to worry about anyone uploading
intimate pictures of yer daughter on You-Tube.
Just yell Eugh! Eugh! Eugh!; leave footprints,
enough hair and scat to make us hopeful, dudes.
BIO: Richard Stevenson has recently retired from a thirty-year teaching gig at Lethbridge College. He is the author of thirty books, most recently, two haikai collections, Fruit Wedge Moon (Hidden Brook Press, 2015) and The Heiligen Effect (Ekstasis Editions, 2015). A long poem sequence on the Clifford Olson murders, Rock, Scissors, Paper is forthcoming.