From Ulises

Being born in the ocean
The Atlantic Ocean
A fifth of the planet was where
I and my family were all free to wander
At depths nobody dare compare
12,000 feet going deeper
As old as the hills you can say
250 million years
The life force was power all the way

When I was caught I was swimming
Near Iceland that volcanic place
The energy there was explosive
The vigour there goes at a pace
From there I was shipped to Barcelona Zoo
A hell of a place I can say
From the might of the ocean
With all its devotion
To a zoo more discordant each day

For 13 long years I was all on my own
I was socially exciting and free
To be left on my own it was debilitating
The conflict was inside of me
Raging a tumult at variance
With all of the freedoms before
I died many times in my heart and my soul
And SEAWORLD broke every law

The harmony and understanding
Our pod was the best pod around
We sang to the very same hymn sheet
And we all pulled together and found
Fortune and skills that were lovely
We just had a perfect rapport
And then to be left in a lonely old zoo
Well it got really into my core

I was defiant and daring
Trying the brave face but I
Found it enormously challenging
And after ten years just to die
Would have been some path I felt like taking
They were brazen to me at that zoo
And then when I got into Sea World
They were insulting there too

It became like a war in my psyche
An incursion of all I held dear
I was up against it
All of that chlorine
Ill fated so stricken with fear
The oxygen there was so choking
The taste of that chlorine so vile
I swam in the waste of my making
Mile after mile after mile

They put themselves up as my master
Despots I just have to say
Throwing my buckets of out of date fish
And expecting me to go and play
Tricks for the moronic people
Screaming it sickened me so
They made me feel like their servant
Dependent on them yes I know

For dead fish for drugs and for torture
Enslavement my yoke was their soul
Downtrodden by the resentment
Held down and made to control
My feelings of leaping and weeping
None of these feelings could I
Have in the tank where I listlessly sank
With my dorsal bent over thats why

Custodians the so called trainers
Without my consent they would give
All sorts of antibiotics and drugs
Pushed into the dead fish, I live
In this soup of a tank in my urine and poo
A cocktail of chlorine and what made it blue
Not just the blue tiles but chemicals they
Added i know what they did every day

Orca’s have feelings and emotions too
We are responsive like some of you
I had deep feelings for my mama
She was my guru she was a star
When I got to SEAWORLD the heartaches I knew
A waking nightmare the torment was true
So broken hearted so full of woe
And I have been long suffering
As you folks all know

40 years old the pain of it all
The sexual abuse that as a rule
Down behind closed doors thats what they do
Its all insufferable and has been all through
Its pulled at my heartstrings and brought me to tears
Caused so much trauma over the years
I would just love to die to just melt away
For its soulless down here being just made to pay

I am leaden and heavy and ready to go
With the angels that come for us
As well we know
Resigned really honestly to waste away
Bereft of all hope as a matter of course
Dare I say
Go down to the bottom
And stay there and be
Asleep forever
Let eternity

Wrap me in splendour
And just let me be
Upright and good
In my integrity