A Brief History of the Abominable Snowman

by Andrew J. Stone

i.
I didn’t always like the snow.
Used to stand right down there,
where the sand meets the tide
and the ocean water would hover
around my hairy shins and my hairs
would float in the sea foam, each one
the size of a little boy’s arm. I
was different. But is that reason enough
to chase me from my home on the Indian
Coast up into Nepal, and from there,
to the top of the Himalayas?

ii.
The first winter was so goddamn cold.
My coat of hair coated in snow every
time I came to consciousness. I
can’t tell you how I survived.
I figure evolution had something
to do with it—how my long black hair
tripled in thickness and whitened in
color. The cold turned my face blue.
Would anything different happen to you?

iii.
Yeti’s not real, they say.
An Abominable Snowman, they say.
Nepal, not far enough. Himalayas,
please. Mount Everest, nope.
Yeti’s not real, they say.
A child has gone missing,
well, his head and limbs at least.
Will you still say I am not real?
Even after you witness the bones
of your boy cracked in the soil
inside the crater your foot created.