Let’s sing a song for the giant giraffe,
our slow-spinning world’s tallest animal.
It roams Africa on legs long as staffs,
with a body like a humpless camel
and skin patterned like some tan leopard’s spots,
or a brown map with wide cream-filled rivers.
It browses tough twigs from highest tree tops
(even sharpest thorns won’t make it quiver!)
yet it gracefully bends low to chew grass
and sip cool water from smooth-flowing streams.
How can it travel without a compass,
I wonder? When sleeping, does it have dreams?
I’ll ask someday if I ever see one.
Meanwhile I’ll dream what it’s like to be one!
Roger Armbrust
March 12, 2012
