Lions Cry by Zavier Davis, Artist Pens, 2018
A picture painted of genuine joy
faces all cheery, smiles wide as the rays of the sun.
Siblings that couldn’t have been farther apart
at the Zoo, our own agendas lured us away
to our personal, opposing jungles.
To us, division added up
it multiplied our own selfishness to
accomplish our individual missions:
subtracting the attention from the others.
Forgive our arms that would
have wrapped each other all the more closely
had we known no one was watching.
The Zoo in us dominated the Zoo we visited.
Repulsive growls and mucky attitudes reeked
the
further
into the
jungle
we
ventured.
Mimicking the lion, the tiger, the bear, oh my!
Every pose a suggested wild side
an urge to consume our prey even if it meant disguise.
From the time we arrived, until the time we departed
We ROARED and we HISSED bickering like the monkeys,
wrestling like the cubs, and cackling like the birds.
Our stench spoke loudly against the elephants
that challenged us. We fought without civility and
spoke the language of the whining rhinos.
Then we paused…
Mom, furious, asked us to pose,
each of us like the animals we were.
Obediently submitting to our keeper to
get what we wanted. Dippin’ Dots that
D
R
I
P
P
E
D
if you ate too slow. But this was
our reincarnation. to come back
as humans this time, domesticated like
animals when given a treat.
But this was all worth it.