what category is this? I don't know. I'm sure it's not mainstream... bored trying to sleep after a few days wide awake. facts about Hannibal are probably all wrong... somebody correct me please. too delirious to look it up right now. ;) ps. i also just realized that elephants don't have toes. so chalk this one up as a lost cause.

Rising, rounded and pale,
barely visible among the far peaks
and folds of a comforted quilt,
curled line of five toes presses
against the       

               sloping angle
formed by counterweight
of covered digits
equal in proportion
if mirrored opposite.


Hidden by snows of warmth,
beneath an uneven patchwork
of forest green, winter white,
wiggling spirits long to trumpet
a warning.        

               Heeding echoes
from below, ivory big toe
slows, then stops steady
progress momentarily,
sensing danger ahead.


But yielding to mastermind
of epic challenge, each toe bends
at the joint, inching forward
like elephant ballerinas
gliding over

               the Himalayas following
Hannibal (it’s all in her head) as his
massive ego, dreams of grandeur,
and ravenous desire for immortality
drive him to Rome.


Top to bottom, head to tail,
I watch artful appendages move
gracefully forward as if unaware
of certain doom. Do they know,
(if Hannibal in my mind

               does not tell them so),
that a deep sleep of historic proportion
awaits them on the other side of this
march through darkness toward the
snowy oblivion of dreams to come?