Ode to This Small Joy - Maria Calabretta Cancio-Bello

[Larry Robinson]

Ode to This Small Joy
 
Someone discovered
the giraffe hums
at a harmonic rate
of 92 Hertz,
voice thrumming
the tower of spine
and trachea once
thought to be silent,
and her humming is
like monks chanting
holy and ascetic,
the vibrations rolling
up the vertebrae
gentle and slow,
a long-lashed
face lifting
from water to sky,
taut dark sides
veined with light
ready to crack
open the body.
 
	- Maria Calabretta Cancio-Bello