111 Chimps let out from their laboratory prisons to live in Chimp Haven

Freedom somewhere deep inside our memory, we see
those open spaces look the verdant grass
and a big tree
its branches sweeping upward
I’m sure that I can climb
feel that bark and taste those buds
and just feel in our prime

conscious once again of daylight
of sunshine it just feels so nice
being able to just move around
we’ve paid the price
thirty years of confinement
and experimentation did
take our thoughts of what is
and somehow we did rid

our minds of all this sanctity
and realise that we
were fodder for the white coats
no one heard our plea
we were just imprisoned
for days on end we sat
peering through those ruddy bars
really getting fat

being shaved and operated on
and feeling sore
and sitting in our cages
really for evermore
sometimes there were flashbacks
of the jungle and the sounds
but as the months turned into years
everything just drowns

out of what was instinct
now the laboratory
the cages and the loneliness
and how it came to be
Africa so far away
the sunshine and the pack
the family what became of them
there was no going back

sadness came and went and came
sorrow too was here
tears I cried so many
but nobody could hear
the pain of being lonely
being alien and lost
yes its true the other chimps around
but this prison cost

many of them their sanity
they couldn’t hack it they
simply just went bonkers
and with their lives did pay
you really had to really hold it
together in this place
try to make the best of it
just try to save your face

tedium was obvious
what really can one do
but sit upon one’s haunches
and try to bring to view
just try to remember
those jungle days of old
playing in the water
and feeling very cold

climbing on the liana
and somersaulting down
chasing one another
around the humans town
being chased by canines
growling angrily
running like the clappers
just up any tree

peering at the rabid hounds
desperate they were to catch
sight of us, they never did
as we were on our patch
and then that day of capture
those growling guys with guns
they threw us into cages
they were clearly sons

of bitches, bloody titches
they manhandled us away
shipped us on some flipping plane
to where we had to stay
I remember that smell
very well
it got into my nose
there’s no smell like it
in the jungle
but on us all it grows

30 years of adversity
living without light
not feeling the sunshine
or the storm clouds bite
no snakes to contend with
just the hands of those
who grab us and inject us
and really just dispose

of all their drugs and medicines
in us, oh I’ve felt sick
my muscles they atrophied
and my tendons have got thick
my eyes are tired and weary
my hearings not that great
my hands are sore
you knw the score
really I can’t wait

to leave this place for ever
to close my eyes one day
and just drift off to somewhere
I think now I did pay
enough to human consciousness
the price was far too high
and now I need to just lay down
and hopefully just die

then one day a commotion
lights were everywhere
the window shields were all pulled back
I could smell fresh air
we were taken downstairs
into the enclosure where
most never come back from
but all of us did share

we sat together freely
no bars around us, we
looked closely at each other
wondering where we be
and why they had un caged us
and left us in a group
and then the doors they opened
I tried but I did stoop

I saw the light, we all did
I saw some grass out there
I felt the warmth upon me
upon my greying hair
I couldn’t help but cry a bit
I ventured out into
a grassy field where clover grew
and buttercups and dew

the air was fresh and tasty
I gulped some breaths and felt
the grass beneath my tired old feet
what sort of hand had dealt
this royal flush kind of hit me
freedom had we won
a period of paradise
underneath the sun

a stream flowed into being
I went down to it, I
put my hand into the water
as it just flowed by
it felt so soft and healing
I felt so calm and well
realising all of us
had been released from hell

we now were in chimp haven
tall trees climbed and ran
lots of grassy pastures
what now was my plan
to rescue flies and butterflies
and watch the red ants crawl
and sit and take in all of this
my life to overhaul