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Hazel Streeter

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The Captured Tiger

I see the tiger
and his waxing and waning shadow,
ever footsore, pacing
in the dirty, rusty cage,
his body bored;
his mind in the forest.
What a dream the forest

is for the lonely tiger,
a picture, but he's bored,
as a lengthening and shortening shadow
looms in and out of the cage,
as the tiger waits, pacing.

Pacing, ever pacing,
crying; 'Let me back to the forest!'
trapped, in a cage,
the helpless tiger,
looking into the shadow,
his mind always bored.

His limbs, bored
from endless pacing
around the only shadow;
beginning to give up hope of the forest,
the only home he knows, moth-eaten tiger,
in his steel-barred cage.

The broken cage
of no use, the tiger no longer bored,
an animal you can no longer call a tiger,
an animal, not up to pacing;
now his mind and soul are in the forest
the floor of the cage full of shadow.

I see in the shadow;
trapped in the cage;
mind in the forest;
a no longer bored,
no longer pacing,
sad and dying tiger.

The dead tiger
Lies in the lengthening shadows
Only its soul is free of pacing, ever pacing...

 

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