The ape came,
walking,
dripping savagery and blood drool,
his mouth agape in idiot awe.

Behind him, the jungle,
fecund, fetid, raw.

The law he knew:

unchallenged reign of strongest claw,

the kill,
unquestioned by prey or predator,

death,

a last contributing,

then,
nothing more.

But, before him,
spread savannahs,
vague visions of vast villages
yet unbuilt.
Gnawing questions.
Disturbing dreams.
The fearful, flickering awakening
of a sporatic

intelligence.

And under the crushing weight of those
first lucid moments,
he snarled,
punched the air to

think

what he might

do.

Struggling to heft the burden
he could not weigh,
he created prototype for progeny.

Confronting the Chaos
confounding him that day,
he fell,

again,

to his knees

and learned to

pray.