My Brother the Ape

Well, I got the invitation

That you sent to everyone

And I told you family picnics weren't exactly my idea of fun

You replied that everyone but me said they were going to come

Which is how you talked me into going to the reunion



When you said everyone, you really meant it



My brother the ape

My brother the ape



I received the photos you sent

And I don't regret that I went

Or the sight of everybody stiffly posing under one tent

But I don't feel I belong and I keep wanting to escape

And I fail to see the likeness between me and my brother the ape



They all kept saying (they all kept saying)

How much we look alike (how much we look alike)

I don't think that we look alike at all (I don't think that we look alike at all)



But I'll admit that I look more like a chimp

Than I look like my cousin the shrimp

Or my distant kin the lichens

Or the snowy egret or the moss

And I find it hard to recognize

Some relatives of ours

Like the rotifer, the sycamore

Iguanas and sea stars



My brother the ape

My brother the ape



They say you don't get (they say you don't get)

To choose your family (to choose your family)

But there's no other one to choose (but there's no other one to choose)



So that's why I'm writing this now

And you can tell my sister the cow

That I meant to thank her for the gorgonzola

And I'll allow that I've been acting like a stranger

But you guys are all so strange

Though I think of what I'm like

And I can see we're all the same



So this time next year, we'll meet at my place



My brother the ape

My brother the ape