Philip Larkin: Ape Experiment Room

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Capuchin Monkeys (Cebus capucinus, from Cebus apella group), sharing: photo by Frans de Waal, from K. Powell, Economy of the Mind, 2003; image by Ayacop, 2006

Buried among white rooms
Whose lights in clusters beam
Like suddenly-caused pain,
And where behind rows of mesh
Uneasy shifting resumes
As sterilizers steam
And the routine begins again
Of putting questions to flesh

That no one would think to ask
But a Ph.D. with a beard
And nympho wife who --

.................................But
There, I was saying, are found
The bushy, T-shaped mask,
And below, the smaller, eared
Head like a grave nut,
And the arms folded round.

Philip Larkin (1922-1985): Ape Experiment Room, 1985, in Collected Poems, 1983

 Two Chained Monkeys: Pieter Bruegel the Elder, 1562, oil on oak panel, 20 x 23 cm (Staatliche Museum, Berlin)