GRIZZLY BEARS FEEL THE POUNDING
- jenminotti
- Aug 2
- 1 min read
By Joshua Meander
PROMPT — Ask Me.
I sniffed the gray smoke.
Felt the pounding drum,
Claw Creek Sioux warnings
That I’m being delisted by the white man.
Hunters want to mount my head on their walls.
Mountainsides, forests & meadows.
Yellowstone Park my stomping ground.
I amble as solitary
Husky Brown bear once protected
By treaty, I am not a nuisance
To picnic-goers or hikers.
I run at forty miles per hour
Away from or towards target,
Though I weigh seven hundred pounds.
The Black Bear is bona fide aggressor.
Confrontation --- not what I seek,
But food, bugs, tree bark, grass & elk.
Each Brown Bear is distinguished
In character. Re-think shooting.
Consult naturalist for proof.
But how can I live
Thirty years when the gross debate
Of my breeding is disturbing
To a species that trims its fur
So as to not look menacing,
Yet they are always on the brink
Of decimating their own kind.
At each Dawn & Dusk
The call from the Sioux,
A swath of smoke drifts,
I wear it like a gray collar
From tribe who speak on my behalf.
Joshua Meander writes poems that are romantic in spirit with a touch of drama. He writes from Forest Hills, NY.
