Elephants, a poem by Nan Faraday

For Dee Who Is Practicing Elephants

An elephant can't raise the rent,
but it can raise the roof,
its trunk aloof and trumpeting,
straining civility with its
high pitched glissande, gaining
the rafters and pushing on,
nothing like a glockenspiel,
nothing like a fife; trumpet,
yes, or siren. I guess an
elephant might lullaby its child,
sleepy love songs, mild and
motherly (or fatherly). But
in public, its repertoire is
otherly, dramatic in its blaring
chill, its shrill immediacy.
It's not easy to get the hang of.
Elephant child, practicing, not
trumpet, but kazoo, so much more
charming than wailing parent,
disarming in an altogether
different way, a sound more play
than get-down-to-it. A sound
more spoof, than raise the roof.
An elephant can't raise the rent,
but it can raise your eyebrows.