Animals On My Mind.

 Leave Them Alone

Ivory is simply teeth
something elephants need
they’re used for many things you know:
to dig stuff up to feed,
to fight for mating rights as well
so that they can breed,
digging wells for water,
and so I humbly plead
just let elephants keep their tusks
they weren’t made for your greed.

Rhino horn is keratin,
the same as hair and nails
The thought that it’s a medicine
is simply old wives’ tales.
Any benefit derived
from that, though none is known,
could be got - and free of charge -
from munching on your own!

Tiger bones and body parts
aren’t medicine, at least
they’re no different from the bones
of any other beast.
Superstition tells you that
the tiger makes you strong.
Please, leave the tiger’s bones
and parts where they belong.

Stealing bile from bears is such
a dreadful thing to do.
it causes so much suffering
but not of course to you.
Don’t you know that you have bile?
Your body makes it’s own.
Doing things like this tells me
your heart is made of stone.

All these ancient myths we see
are leading to extinction
Please spread the message
and make clear this distinction:
Animals of every kind
are made like every other.
So think before you cause the death
or suffering of another.

CS 2017


Pity the Poor Pangolin.

Pangolins are beautiful, though you may not agree,
they wear a suit of armour, as you can plainly see.
Their tongues are long and sticky for catching what they eat:
insects, lots and lots of them, not vegetables or meat.

Their coats are made of keratin, like talons, nails or hair
they need them for protection, so predators beware!
But some misguided people seem to think they’re magic
They kill the poor things for their scales, it’s stupid and it’s tragic.

If you tried using nails or hair as medicine instead
those would heal you just as much. Really, use your head!
Instead of paying all that cash for something that is fake
Think about the animals whose lives the smugglers take.

A hundred thousand pangolins are captured every year
and now they face extinction. Can you not shed a tear?
The smugglers don’t care at all, they do it for the money
as gullible consumers pay and lap it up like honey.

CS 2017


Crying For the Dying

So many creatures used and abused
so many stupid reasons given for their deaths;
whales and dolphins, sharks and rays, turtles too and more,
end up as a meal after taking their last breaths.

Some though end up suffering, performing for their keep
stolen from their families and locked up for life -
restricted lives cut short just to entertain the masses,
and reports of unsuitable conditions are rife.

Some tiny creatures - seahorses and turtles -
are caught and imprisoned live in plastic keyring fobs.
what sort of person can think that this is ethical?
How poor do you have to be to do these kinds of jobs?

Baby seals slaughtered, brutally, cruelly,
apparently to save the fish - to have with chips and peas -
totally ignoring the reason for the low stocks
is man’s over fishing and pollution of the seas.

Don’t get me started with what is done to primates -
So many slaughtered to steal a single child
Many die in transit which makes it more distressing
Let the poor things live their lives out there in the wild.

Birds shot or captured to grace somebody’s living room -
honestly the list goes on, there really is no end
to wickedness visited on all our fellow creatures,
each one we could otherwise regard as a friend.

CS 2017


Get it Right!

Do you remember the dodo,
the bird that went extinct?
People ate the very last one.
Clever, don’t you think?
We’re supposed to be intelligent.
Out brains are bigger, albeit
what do we use this intelligence for?
Frankly I don’t see it. 

It’s like the man on the branch of a tree
whilst cutting it from the trunk;
we’re destroying all that lives and breathes
and replacing it with junk.
People, take a look at yourselves,
ask yourself: is it wise
to kill every creature and habitat
from forest to sea to skies?

The planet of course will renew itself
it’s done it so many times
but humans are digging a grave for themselves.
Is this the crime of crimes?
Whether or not you believe in a god
who is watching over all
it’s in our hands to get it right
or prepare ourselves for a fall.

CS 2017


Canned Hunts

Canned hunts:  barbaric,
cowardly, obscene;
hand reared animals
drugged, confined, and shot
by men with guns but no balls,
the young die when the mother falls
and the "hunter" ups and walks.
Animals without a choice
crying without a voice
but oh! how money talks.

© Jan 2003



The Colossal Squid

The colossal squid is a fearsome beast
with parrot's beak and enormous eyes.
It has arms so strong it strives with whales
and grows to an unbelievable size.

It's tentacles are armed with hooks,
swiveling claws that are razor sharp.
Once a legend, now a fact;
no more will listeners laugh or carp.

In Antarctic waters it has its home,
eating whatever swims its way;
it takes exceptional strength and size
to avoid becoming this creature's prey.

If you dream of a life on the Southern Seas
midst howling gales and cliffs of ice,
just think about the colossal squid
and stay away, is my advice.

CS
©2006



Bug Poo I and II


1
Ants on a fig tree
farming bugs.

Diligent, they watch for
the moment of emergence,

greedily relishing
bug poo, honeydew.


II

Dust mites, invisible,
skin scales their bread;
irritate intensely
pooing in your bed.

CS
© 2007


Mostly Fish

Why are dolphins drawn to us?
Hmm, let me think...

A creature of high intelligence
with mostly fish for company...

Yep. That would do it.

© 2005


On Dogs

If I should ever have a dog
give me a quintessential dog,
a dog that doesn't yip or yap
or trip me up or snip and snap.

An honest dog who shows respect
not fawning, but with head erect;
submissive and obedient, yes,
but proud of bearing nonetheless.

A dog of stature, large and strong
who knows that she and I belong
to times more primitive than these
when shelter was in caves and trees.

A dog much like her ancestor
with wolf-like cast and character,
a dog with whom I can commune
and howl beneath the moon.


© 2004


Perfidy

Daughters plot behind their father's back, sister slays sister and steals her lover, and a family are torn asunder - not Shakespeare but everyday stories from the world's largest wolf pack living in Yellowstone National Park.



The dark queen was beautiful but merciless and violent,
her first love was shot but she soon was re-allied.
Now she is dead and her new lover heartlessly
rules in her stead with her sister by his side.

It's a story of infamy, unscrupulous conspiracy,
of backbiting treachery and family intrigue;
where sister slays sister and takes on her family
and worse yet, the dead sister's lover was in league.

His headship is challenged, he fights off his enemy.
Now, it would seem, his position is secure
but a stranger appears and attracts the leader's daughters;
he's big and he's handsome, his intentions far from pure.

Caught in flagrante, the daughters go back home again
the stranger then vanishes, for a while at least
but always his presence is there in the memory
like a nasty smell, or the spectre at the feast.

One day he's back there, seeking to consolidate.
The daughters are tempted and go with him once more
along with some others, deserters from the family;
they form a rival faction. This could lead to war.

This isn't history, nor is it Shakespearian;
it happens quite frequently, it could be last week.
A family is torn apart, mercilessly severed,
in a Yellowstone wolf pack, up at Druid Peak.

CS © 2004



 Fox

The fox is often hunted
which leaves some folk affronted.
The handsome inspiration
for so much altercation,
is either loved or hated,
its nature much debated.
Often it is thought to be
just out on a killing spree,
indiscriminate in its slaughter
slaying far more than it oughta.
No, my friend, not so.

It's rep has been corrupted;
if not interrupted
it buries all it slays,
a store for leaner days.
We fail to understand
it has its future planned;
with little ones to raise and feed
such behaviour isn't greed.
Necessity drives every creature,
avarice is a human feature
as our waistlines show.

CS
© 2003



A Basic Need

No matter who or what we are
we all need someone to love
It's a basic need like food or drink
like the air we breathe
or the thoughts we think
all of us long to belong to another
it's what life's all about

A lioness adopting a calf
or a monkey adopting a puppy
cats with rats or rabbits with dogs
donkeys with goats or sheep or hogs
they all have a craving
for close encounters
of this there is no doubt. 

No matter what or who we are
we all need someone to love
someone to share a warm embrace
to acknowledge the look upon one's face
whether furred or feathered
it's fundamental
the solitary life is out.

CS
08/ 2002




Philosophical Ramblings.

Does the butterfly know courage
when first it leaves the cocoon?
Having left it's earthbound pedestrian life
of eating, eating, and yet more eating
to hibernate for many days
on the underside of a leaf
to break down into genetic soup
it now has to start all over again
struggle free, out into the light
stretch its wings and soar on high.
How brave is the butterfly?

Does the lioness know courage
when she faces the male who comes along
and wants to mate and sees her young as
a threat to his own genetic line;
when she drives him away with tooth and claw
to defend her young ones sired elsewhere
does she stop to think "Oh, this is scary"
or just act purely on instinct?
What courage she shows in human terms
but a mother's desire to defend her young
is pretty instinctive under duress.
How brave is the lioness?

A baby bird has to leave the nest
learn to fly and fend for itself
and we put it down to instinct
but is it afraid of the cat and the owl
the predators all around?
Does it have to pluck up courage
to launch itself off that bough?
To struggle at length with its very first worm
which must be a little daunting
and we call it nature, take it for granted
that's just what creatures do.
Is talk of courage absurd?
How brave is the little bird?

I ask because I'm human,
and humans like to know.
We want to know what makes us tick
why we do the things we do
or why we sometimes don't.
Is courage merely an instinct
born of the need to survive?
or is it something we can control
by an act of will, determination?
We like to think we're so brave
ripping our fears assunder
but are we really? I wonder.

CS  © July2002





The Rat


Of all the things that I could praise
this, this the most heroic:
the noble rat, oft much maligned,
is, of all beasts, most stoic

survivor of millennia
despite man's cunning ruses
rats will always be around
and have so many uses!

so many creatures feed on them
the owl and fox and cat
and yet they thrive despite it all
and multiply at that!

Oh noble rat, I sing your praise
Oh oft disparaged rodent
it seems when asked to soldier on
you didn't know what "no" meant

when tamed and kept within a cage
or used for awful testing
we do not then despise your kind
but find you quite arresting

a friendly and most loyal pet
intelligent and and clever
you survive where other creatures
cease from their endeavour

so, noble rat, my work is done.
Although your name is blighted
I for one think well of you
indeed, you should be knighted!

© July 2002