Frenzy

Surely they’re not as whacked out as they seem
circling madly in their penguin-y finery,
not unlike the swim I’ve made around you these last few years.
A poor substitute for a thousand-mile
jaunt off the scenic coast of Ecuador for any of us.
Their sudden disinterest in sedentary life, the mundane
groom and burrow of the everyday, has nothing to do
with personality disorder any more than my yearning
for deliverance from quotidian chores.

Some new guys in the pool and it’s a sudden marathon around
the shallow. To swim is to be a penguin if they could, the birds might clack.
Surely life is more than molt and breed. The curiosity evoked
by the glimpse of glossy difference would entertain
any of us on the boring back of the mating season. And surely
we cannot deny our essential selves. After all,
what could there be, what else as much distraction as to spin?