I named my pet monkey Moses
because he parts the peanut shells
with the precision of scripture,
lifting his small hands in blessing
before launching into his pilgrimage
across the bright, tiled kitchen,
a banana clutched, golden and faintly
radiant in the afternoon light.
I named him Moses for the comedy
of it too, this small prophet leaping
atop the fridge, surveying the land
of cereal boxes, his promised domain.
But late at night, as he sleeps,
curled in the basket by the door,
I wonder who exactly he is leading
and if I am the desert after all.