The Apes of Eden - The Antiquities by Jon P. Gunn (books to read in your 20s .txt) 📕

a missing page in tribal history.

The "War in Heaven" is a common theme

in ancient lore--so common, it would seem,

that writers who refer to it suppose

it is a story everybody knows,

which needn't be repeated. Since they fail

to give the Plot, or even much detail,

it’s hard to build a narrative around

the mere allusions, which are all I’ve found.

The War occurred; of that there’s little doubt,

since apes cannot be brusquely ordered out.

Apparently the Tribe was put to flight,

but surely not without a brutal fight.

A third, still stranger, theory says we came

from human beings. That one’s rather lame!

No ape with half his wits about him can

believe we Higher Apes evolved from Man--

the lowest of the primates, mere cartoons,

the moral peers of mandrills or baboons!

And yet this superstition still persists

among small cliques of crypo-atheists,

who flaunt their right to "freedom of belief"

with grudging toleration by our Chief.

Some ancient scribes, rejecting "theory," say

we’ve always been as we exist today;

we neither dropped from Heaven nor arose

"by evolution" from our racial foes.

That open-ended past I can’t conceive,

nor do I know which theories to believe.

I only know that Eden, lush and fair,

exists, and we originated there.

How else can one explain how "Eden" came

to be our own distinctive tribal name?

From most surviving records, it appears

we stayed in Eden twenty million years--

but some say twenty billion. Others give

a shorter span. I can’t be positive

when scribal records handed down to me

are mistransmitted so creatively.

We lived a tranquil and idyllic life

unmarred by hardships, danger, toil and strife.

In Eden every fruit this planet knew,

and every flower, in profusion grew.

The lotus blossoms, amaranths* and palms

enriched the zephers with their fragrant balms,

and rainbow-colored lovebirds trilled among

the vines, where grapes the size of melons hung.

The very weeds were elegantly decked

with breeds of flowers one would least expect.

We gorged on fruits, fresh-ripened every day

for our convenience, in profuse array.

Among the shady fronds we took our ease,

or chased each other up and down the trees,

or polished up our acrobatic stunts

on boughs that bore a dozen fruits at once,

dislodging pears on one another’s head

and seeing mangoes ripen in their stead--

or any crop that met the moment’s needs.

We pelted passersby with rinds and seeds.

We made up games, then freely changed the rules.

We grinned at our reflections in the pools.

Uncounted generations came and went

before we tired of ease and merriment.

In autumn of our twenty millionth year

some Mental Ferment started to appear.

A wise old ape, with fur of iron-gray,

would circulate among us, day by day,

persuading us that Eden could not be

unless created by a Deity.

He thought a cosmos ruled by natural laws

in order to exist, must have a Cause.

_______________

*At

Publication Date: 02-05-2014

All Rights Reserved

Dedication:
To my friend Kent who shares my legacy