Jumbo's Lament

I sit with my keeper in the dark
of my den, guzzling the whisky
he brings for me most nights.

When the toothache and memories
overtake me, I smash the cage
they made to contain my strength.

King of the Elephants they call me,
not my lineage of birth-right,
the first of my kind to see these shores.

Man has always been there
at the centre of my memory,
when they riddled my mother with spears,

snatched me from the grasslands,
when they chained and jailed me,
dragged their prize across the sea.

Then I met him.
A man unlike the others,
the first to see me for myself.

A man who sat apart from his herd,
who swore to protect and nourish me,
our first taste of friendship.

He dredged the disease from my skin,
guided me as my masters set me to work
carrying their children on my back.

Pain endures through the night.
It wakes me from my sleep,
from dreams of grass and acacia trees,

yet he is always there, whisky in hand,
to sooth the pain away,
his and mine, night after night after night.

(This poem was inspired by the recent David Attenborough documentary on Jumbo the Elephant, entitled "Attenborough and the Giant Elephant". There is also a video version of this poem available on my YouTube channel.)