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'Man Hollowed Out Wooden
Leg To Smuggle Iguanas'
         – BBC News headline

I would have got away with it
but for the noise –
claws scratching at the wood,
those genteel coughing sounds
iguanas make.

“One moment, sir”
I knew then I was done for.
“ If you could come this way. . .”

In my skivvies, standing on one leg,
I watched him spring the secret trapdoor –
out they tumbled – all my little darlings
skittering across the polished floor.
Tiny dinosaurs in Terminal Two.

It’s said that they escaped into the drains
and flourished there . . .

One day they will return, Godzilla-like
crunching Jumbo jets to junk
between their claws, reeking of jet juice
and a thousand rotting airline meals.

Iguama with mouth open looking right