ANIMAL MAGIC (2)

The animal world encompasses extremes. Elephant and mouse, gorilla and guinea pig: all manage to survive on this amazing planet and seem to confirm that size doesn't matter. 
Today's poem is about that astoundingly elongated creature, the giraffe.

THE GIRAFFE

The lofty giraffe, it would seem,
is vertical in the extreme.
With head and hoof so far apart,
his height is almost off the chart.
He is unquestionably thin
and has exotic mottled skin.
His neck leads to a freakish head
that he can easily embed
in foliage that just cannot
be reached by creatures short and squat,
but when he runs, with loping stride
and head held high as though with pride,
perhaps for joy, perhaps in flight,
he is a most ungainly sight.