At Woodward’s Gardens

A boy, presuming on his intellect
Once showed two little monkeys in a cage
A burning-glass they could not understand
And never could be made to understand
Words are no good: to say it was a lens
For gathering solar rays would not have helped
But let him show them how the weapon worked
He made the sun a pinpoint on the nose
Of the first one, then the other, till it brought
A look of puzzled dimness to their eyes
That blinking could not seem to blink away
They stood arms laced together at the bars
And exchanged troubled glances over life
One put a thoughtful hand up to his nose
As if reminded--or as if perhaps
Within a million years of an idea
He got his purple little knuckles stung
The already known had once more been confirmed
By psychological experiment
And that were all the finding to announce
Had the boy not presumed too close and long
There was a sudden flash of arm, a snatch
And the glass was the monkey's, not the boy's
Precipitately they retired back-cage
And instituted an investigation
On their part, though without the needed insight
They bit the glass and listened for the flavor
They broke the handle and the binding off it
Then none the wiser, frankly gave it up
And having hid it in their bedding straw
Against the day of prisoners' ennui
Came dryly forward to the bars again
To answer for themselves:
Who said it mattered
What monkeys did or didn't understand?
They might not understand a burning-glass
They might not understand the sun itself
It's knowing what to do with things that counts