Great Ocean of Green
you fall to a man made flame.
You are stripped bear from your mother’s cloak
and replaced.
Maybe if you could scream
in a frequency my ears could hear
you would not be killed in such a way.

Striped, plain, golden, gray.
Meat eaters, plant grazers,
turn your racket down.
Your wails are far too loud.
Maybe if you had human speech
we’d be equals in my eyes,
and neither your home nor your life
would be up for me to grab.

Northerners, southerners, easterners, westerners.
Pale skinned, black skinned and copper skinned folk.
Hunters and farmers and healers alike
I command you to stop talking at once!
I can’t understand your gibberish.
Maybe if you spoke my native tongue
you could make yourself understood,
and we could sit down and chat
the way the civilized do.

Who’s next? I’ll give you a clue.
Listen close, it might be you,
Because maybe if you shared my sex,
my age,
my god,
my blood,
if you shared my name,
I would find it in my ever-loving heart
to deem you worthy of the delicacy
that is my respect.

Just maybe, though.