New World Order

I want to live in a world where 
yetis wander nature preserves freely 
begging for picnic scraps from tourists,

a world where the U is dropped from U.F.O.s 
and Google Maps tracks the Nazca Lines,

a world where Mona Lisa’s smile 
is nothing more than an inside joke everyone knows
and a Cracker Jack decoder ring
reveals Da Vinci’s code,

a world where the Knights Templar worship
openly alongside Freemasons 
under the watchful all-seeing eye

and backyard gardeners fence their veggies 
from hungry jack-a-lopes and clumsy flocks of dodos 

and a 20,000-year-old dry-aged wooly mammoth 
steak is the daily special at Appleby’s

and plesiosaurs are as plentiful as perch in Lake Erie.

I want to live a world where 
the Law of Evolution is the Holy Trinity 
of fish, ape, and man.

Kip Knott | The Loaded Violin
Contents | Mudlark No. 50 (2013)