Every morning
I go down to the garage
and lift the large metal door
and I get on my
Nordic track hamster wheel
and walk
3.5 miles per hour
at a 7 incline
for 30 minutes
this is the way
I try to keep high cholesterol
and heart disease at bay
I live as
the unnatural man
I find myself
with the unnatural problems
of too much food and
too little activity
as I plod along
in the misty morning air
I see the plants with the
long stems and the bright blue flowers
and they naturally reach
for their god, the sun
and they don’t appear overweight
and they have no disease
in their capillaries
and every morning
a humming bird comes along
checking the inventory in
the blue flowers
I marvel as it hangs there
darting diagonally like
some cosmic Etch-A-Sketch
is controlling it
and it seems happy
and it speeds away
only to return tomorrow
and as I complete
my routine on the treadmill
I see a big, slow moving black bug
sauntering into the garage
I try to scoot it outside with my foot
but my oversized plastic running shoes
lack precision
and I accidentally injure one of its legs
it hobbles away and I say a silent prayer of
remorse and forgiveness
then I go into the backyard
and let Maggie and Mona out
these two Yorkshire terriers
play and frolic and urinate
and romp and defecate
and then come back inside
and I think
they are stuck somewhere
between me and the hummingbird
they haven’t lost their
natural spontaneity or purpose
even though they are products
of human technology
perhaps we are the missing links
that future generations will
look back on and wonder
I feed them from the bag
filled with manufactured kibble
and I check the time
and remember
I need to shower
and strap on my loin cloth
take my club out of its charger
get in my car
and return to the jungle
it’s a short drive,
evolutionarily speaking.