This is not a gallery, but a zoo,
where the paintings pace, deranged,
divorced from natural habitats,
in the company of creatures unknown
in their own countries.
There is such a smell in summer,
when the droppings pile in fetishist mounds
and the keepers cannot keep pace
with the output of fear and boredom,
from a diet based on dead things.
And the flies; the flies that gather
round the cages and buzz, buzz,
as they feast with all due frenzy
and become part of the exhibit,
so that visitors recoil from their drear sound.
Sometimes, looking through the bars,
there is only foliage to see, undisturbed
by any signs of life, while the notice
clearly states there are herds or prides
or flocks of creatures on display.
While, out in the wild, art succumbs
to global warming and becomes
a dried-up vestige that prowls
the perimeters of villages and ekes
a bare existence from their dustbins.
