Zoo’s are not the answer
\nThey are prison for the crime
\nOf wanting to have freedom
\nAnd there really is no rhyme
\nOr reason to imprison them
\nTo educate our young
\nTrying to make a profit
\nAnd remain unsung
\nWild animals exist
\nIn their own habitats
\nEssential nature
\nIs of course the way
\nEnduring and surviving
\nThey live where they were born
\nThey all live for each moment
\nOf each day<\/p>\n
Wildness is their saviour
\nIt builds their state of mind
\nA life long learning attitude
\nAlways they will find
\nTheir state of health
\nIs manifest
\nIn what they drink and eat
\nThey live as they were born to live
\nFor them life is complete
\nMan’s dealing with the wild ones
\nLacks a lot of understanding
\nArrogance is commonplace
\nWith ignorance expanding
\nCaptivity the imprisonment
\nOf creatures of the wild
\nTaken from their social order
\nMany as a child
\nSuch cruelty the evidence
\nFor anyone to see
\nMatriarchal knowledge
\nFlowing evidently
\nWildness is the universal
\nTonic they adore
\nCaptivity breaks every rule
\nIts something they abhor
\nBesides a business model
\nOf profitability
\nWhen all ones stock
\nIs living in their cells
\nUnfortunately
\nStressed out and having lost
\nTheir only antidote for life
\nLocked up in some mangy cage
\nWhere boredom leads to strife<\/p>\n
Life becomes matter of fact
\nOr fictional in a way
\nThe rhythm of wild spaces
\nOn any given day
\nLost ofcourse to concrete
\nTo monotony and routine
\nDevised by human personnel
\nThat truthfully does demean
\nIts then just regularity
\nEverything is arranged
\nYou eat what you are given
\nAnd thats hardly ever changed
\nIts a far cry from our family life
\nOur social worlds away
\nIt is unrealistic
\nAnd diverse I have to say<\/p>\n
The symbiotic reasoning
\nTo actually want to be
\nAlive and facing wildness
\nHead on fancifully
\nIs missing there is conflict
\nIn the soul
\nAmbivalence and disparity
\nYou havent got a role
\nChains around your feet
\nA small enclosure only you
\nRestricted and conflicted
\nIn what you choose to do
\nYour generous proportions
\nCrammed into a small space
\nHaving to walk on concrete
\nIt easy to lose face<\/p>\n
The smell of men is foreign
\nWe lose the right to see
\nAnd interact with others
\nAnd bond remarkably
\nIts unashamedly obvious
\nLiving every day
\nBeing treated like a criminal
\nLocked up and made to pay
\nThey are lightweights
\nMaking lots of noise
\nOne sweep and they are gone
\nPuny fragile delicates
\nWho foist themselves upon
\nOur being half expecting
\nThat we will knuckle down
\nAnd do what ever is expected
\nIn humanity we drown<\/p>\n
The zoo is just a prison
\nBars and cages everywhere
\nThere is no panorama
\nJust walls leading to despair
\nNo wind no rain so sunlight
\nNo mud baths with our friends
\nDetached from mother nature
\nAnd truthfully it sends
\nAll of us stir crazy
\nOur rank is broken by
\nThe systems and the standards
\nAnd the regimented high
\nThat comes with translocation
\nIt dislocates ones thought
\nWe are really being tampered with
\nNot something that we sought<\/p>\n
What is our nonconformity
\nNew age travellers so to say
\nFollowing the matriarch
\nShe always knew the way
\nImprinted in her matter grey
\nThe water holes and places
\nWhere favourite fruits and lush green leaves
\nWere worth our uphill paces
\nMopani Ramadiba
\nAnd old Lammie we are here
\nIn joburg zoo its hot its true
\nAll of us do fear
\nThe bullhooks and the whipping sticks
\nI know we are huge and could
\nSlaughter any mahout
\nAnd some of us we would<\/p>\n
But what we do is settle
\nRemember every face
\nOne day we will reward them
\nSend them back to base
\nOur memories are long ones
\nZoo’s are places where
\nAll those in captivity
\nAre living with despair
\nWe came from the circus
\nBoth wild caught so we
\nCan remember life at home
\nWith our family
\nThe long walks and the
\nWildness
\nThe circus and the tricks
\nThe bullhooks and the
\nSwearing
\nI would have knocked for six<\/p>\n
Some of those rough handlers
\nAnd the intermittant way
\nThey feed us and they water us
\nOn any given day
\nSweltering in the hot sun
\nThe enclosure dusty too
\nThere is no water in the pool
\nThe infrequency its true
\nIt really does get to us
\nFlapping our ears we do
\nBut we need water in the pit
\nTo endure is to be true
\nLong standing on the concrete
\nReally hurts our feet
\nOur weight is not in conflict
\nBut i tell you I am beat<\/p>\n
Powerless and impotent
\nSuch vulnerability
\nInactive for hours on end
\nFatigued of course we be
\nDormant sluggish vegetating
\nFor the eternity
\nInfluenced by dominance
\nThe keepers carry weight
\nBrandishing their bullhooks
\nWe soon accept our fate
\nThere isnt any interplay
\nNo calves around to aid
\nNo happiness to speak of
\nBeing the stock in trade
\nThe zoo is making money
\nFrom inviting people to
\nPay to come and watch us
\nLiving in the zoo<\/p>\n
They think they are a circus
\nMaking us do tricks
\nNo respect whatsoever
\nJust a bunch of dicks
\nWho come along and shout at us
\nAnd throw buns and even rocks
\nAnd when we are not servicing their point of view
\nThe locks
\nAre heavily engaged and clearly
\nWe know the time has come
\nThis is life here in the zoo
\nSomeone bang a drum
\nWake us from this melancholy
\nThis over sensitivity
\nTo everything that happens here
\nFor Its hell on earth for them and me<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Zoo’s are not the answer They are prison for the crime Of wanting to have freedom And there really is no rhyme Or reason to imprison them To educate our young Trying to make a profit And remain unsung Wild … Continue reading