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Snake Man
You there
Man of stone
How can you call me an animal?
You kill and take all that is not yours
Anything your empty eyes land upon
You think you deserve.
You there
Man of hate
How can you satisfy your hunger?
Your hunger for power and dominance
All that you see was here before you
It will be here long after.
We are here
Animals of life
How can we continue normal life?
Trees we grew up in are gone
Whole species are disappearing rapidly
Yet we are to blame.
We are here
Animals of love
How can you slay us like monsters?
We only exist to protect our families
We didn’t know that was a crime
To pay with our lives.
We were here
Animals of beauty
How could we flourish under polluted skies?
We tried to use our voice to beg you to stop
You silenced us before we got the chance to speak
The weight of all our stolen souls isn’t enough
To even chip the Stone Man’s shoulder.
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I wrote this after viewing the Snake Man, 1994, piece of art at the University of Virginia Fralin Art Museum by Alison Saar. The artwork was a part of the Writer's Eye and it was of a man of stone holding a red snake in his teeth. It really inspired me to think about the deeper meaning about the relationship between man and nature, but from the lesser told perspective of the animals.