I wish that you’d listened to the call of leaves and the purring in trees, but you got distracted, turned away (as they do), and left me astray on the path to the wild ravine. It’s okay this way. I’m used to it, admittedly. And I’m not what I’d call gentle beneath. Biologically predisposed to think diagonally, to cut through the grove and creep nocturnally, catty-cornered to the sun soaked drove. People have got stand in line, so I stretch miles between us, chance the off-beat, and tip-toe beneath the canopy throes.
Is it better to wear stripes of captivity?
I wonder sometimes of a society that ransoms the sum for autonomy. Then machetes away at my instinct. Lash the beast and repeat to extinction. And does the tiger bare burns of the ropes that ensnare? And does war till she’s broke
Free from the bounds. Deep tissue scars to bar the quizzical fiend.
I’ve earned my stripes, you might say, of the caged tigress
That it’s in its nature to protest. And then digress into the trees.
I prowl beneath the cacophony. A jungle tale wails like sirens in my head.
Until I find that every time that I escape
Society rings…
And doesn’t stop…
Till I pick up…
The call…