The tusks of female elephants were straighter than the males’. The tusk of the average- sized female elephant yielded five billiard balls. Sales documents of that time often refer to the ivory of female elephants as ‘billiard’.
~a placard in Stone Town, Zanzibar
To be called the thing
your body’s used for,
that’s metonymy.
I’ve never heard
a woman called
Fuck but I don’t
speak all the
languages. It’s true
in English women
call men Dicks.
When I look at
an elephant I don’t
see a billiard ball,
but marauders
did. Using only her
head an elephant
can level a tree
or a hillside. I recall
a coffee table
of a distant cousin
made from an
elephant’ ear.
Its legs were made
of legs (and feet)
which had thin,
black bristles,
which I in horror
touched. An elephant
may flap her ears
before charging,
before laying you
flat as a table. She
may call you Man
or Beast or she
may call you Table.