TO ROAR WITH RAGE

TO ROAR WITH RAGE

He awoke with a start,
And heard distinctly,
The beat of his fluttering heart.
There was fear in his eyes,
There was fear in his mind,
As he jumped up with his gun,
And sharply glanced behind.

The campfire was dead and cold.
It was darkness,
And the dark makes the lion bold.

He had heard a lion roar,
Once, twice or countless times before.
But that was a defeated, tired lion
Clawing at the bars of his cage.
This was the first time
He had heard a lion roar with rage.

The first time a man is afraid of a lion,
Is when he hears him roar.
But the lion makes him fear life itself
Twice more.
For seeing a lion, awakens his fears
And once again his fears soar.
The third and the last time
Of being afraid
Is when the definition of fear itself
Was made...
It is when a lion
Charges at you
A hunted, mortally wounded lion,
With revenge his due.

All this he had been told.
Yet he stood up straight.
His eyes merciless and cold.
And he saw in the distant moonlight,
The glittering of fur,
Shiny as gold.

He comfortably balanced his gun,
And took off into the fading moonlight
On a determined run.
He followed the ominous shadow
Until he almost dropped.
And then suddenly
By the mercy of God,
The shadow stopped.

Then just as he could sight his gun,
The last wisp of moonlight
Disappeared over the horizon.
The fear returned with a weight
Of more than a ton.
For now he was on the mercy
Of the slowly approaching sun.

For whatever be the story told,
The darkness
Makes the lion bold.
Then he heard again,
What he would remember till old age
He heard a lion,
Roar with rage.

It knew he was there,
It had smelt him out.
It would do him as good,
To sit silent
Or to scream and shout.

The minutes passed away
Like hours.
And soon in the sky,
Began fading the stars.
For whatever be the situation may
It promised to be
A colourful day.

Then he heard the chilling sound,
Of a lion
Swiftly covering ground.
For even with fur rich as gold,
The darkness
Made the lion bold.

At this point,
Only one thing can be said
The sun had not risen
And he knew he was dead.

But then miraculously,
The unseen lion became a silhouetted beast.
And he realised with surprise
He was facing east.

The sun rose behind the lion,
Making him an easy shot.
A single bullet
And the death of a great king,
Was what it brought.

And in these sad times,
Of looting and crime
The lions are all but gone!
Never again will they see
The bright African morn.

Thus once again,
As nature turns its page
He was the last man,
Who heard a lion
ROAR WITH RAGE!!

~Rishabh Gulati~

More Poems By Rishabh

Home