Lets reminisce with one circus bear (for a while)

Resentment matched resilience
rancour those who share
the open road
how it can goad
every single bear
our wildness is a quality
that few humans can see
they can’t understand our fury
and irascibility

why would they, they seem contented
with a view to entertain
despite the woes of travelling shows
something they must gain
but for us its such confusion
its an umbrage they pass on
that passion in our psyche
I mean its all but gone

the tedium is evident
a miserable cage is where
and constant movement in some truck
it leads us through despair
into resignation
how our life can be
so uninspiring and so hard
and repugnant actually

its a war of nerves
and the hopelessness
for there’s nothing we can do
but go along with the sick regime
in the hope some light shines through
but there are no expectations really
its sordid and its sad
being made to do stupid tricks
and wear human clothes,that just add
ridicule and derision
to how we feel deep down
and there just is no affection
as we go from town to town

walking on our hind legs
cycling a while
balancing on a barrel
its hard to reconcile
all this fitful bluster
with the wild life that we knew
those windswept hills
those forests
and the massive skies of blue

the vulgarity of performance
our vanity is lost
it intimidates our being
its an enormous cost
that we pay to be a travelling bear
in a troupe of bears that must
lament the passing of our lives
for all of that was lost
the moment we were captured
remorse was ours to hold
and really the discomfort
of the heat and then the cold

of the boredom and our reactions
to the emotions that we feel
there really is no remedy
and thus we just conceal
the hatred of this system
it overwhelms us, we
are sentient creatures after all
and we suffer blatantly
but human beings self absorbed
see nothing of our woe
they treat us as if we are made of wood
we are part of the show
our responsiveness is measured
by their reactions and we see
their mood swings and frustration
when they take it out on me

the trainer he’s impassive
with the temper of an ox
a coarseness that is grating
he suddenly unlocks
a dark impetuosity
that results in beating me
that bloody stick hurts, its really hurts
smashed down upon my knee

and I have to use the cycle
and stand on my hind legs
if there’s lots of pain
how it does drain
he is the dregs
of humanity I am sure of that
he often makes me bleed
I am a mass of bruises
and he’s always taking speed
he’s injecting and he’s drinking
and his anger overflows
he hits his wife
I hear her scream
so for them it grows and grows

the travelling really gets to you
on the truck and off the truck
the miles we drive
the boredom of it
we feel we are worthy of some luck
but we never get even a bit
some joy to help us be
its work and work and suffering
and that is all we see

disillusioned, we are certainly
and the noises of the crowd
the shouting and the jeering
it is jarring, we were proud
bears in touch with nature
we commanded some degree
of respect when we went walking
the demeanour of the free
but now the added tension
of the prisoner whose caged
the slave whose forced to work and work
and of course who isn’t waged
someone else decides your fate
you have no will to be
independent any more
you are lost
depressingly

and you will get disgruntled
and it is bound to show
it may affect your performance
so the beatings are going to grow
the expletives are going to surface
the scowls are going to be
aimed at you day in day out
and it hurts, listen to me
I am lonely no one loves me
no one cares and I
might be a a great big hairy bear
but I crave love which is why
I have a heart
I have a soul
I yearn for some freedom too
to sit to stand
and just understand
that I have the power to do

I have some soothing moments
to just recall some glee
to imagine I am in the hills
with the wind now blowing free
and another bear beside me
a lady whom I love
as we wander together peacefully
under the sky above
instead of this melancholia
that wraps its fingers tight
the angst of being lonely
this evil that I fight
the gravity of resentment
that threatens to create
in me a reason to explode
and crush the reprobate

I know this would be curtains
for me the cold cold steel
would be fired from someones pistol
and my pain would be real
my life it would be over
my dreams then at an end
my love and all my passion
I have now to defend
and so I stay dejected
despondent and subdued
tormented by the moment
frightened by his crude
rantings and his beatings
his sniggering and his smarm
his banality is irksome
I just must remain calm

and think of all the brightness
of a lovely summers day
the gracefulness of dancing trees
who with the music sway
the salmon on their upward jaunt
their flashing silver flight
to get back to the rivers where
they once saw the first light
remembering the storm clouds
flash across the sky
and feel the weight of rain and hail
and sit in the cave and sigh
those memories within me
with my lady at my side
all thrilling and instilling
in me a source of pride