i wrote this poem after i saw horrific cruelty made against bulls: multi mini-spears inserted into their torso, fireworks attached to their horns. this taunting really upset me, so i wrote this angry poem to try and speak up for the emasculated bulls of Spain
I pity your plaintive bellowing
from dungeon-dark prison echoing,
your toro ton-weight electrocuted,
slowly, cruelly to be executed;
what awful, absurd theatre
– cruelty the main feature,
drunken crowds, harmless creature.
O titanic toro! the provacteur’s cape,
this circular hell, you cannot escape;
horns shaved, co-ordination a-kilter
taunted by mocking lance-tilters;
weary, stigmata-stabbed, confused;
upholding tradition, riseable ruse,
righteouness seasonally refused.
Fiesta trumpets jocularly mock,
sober people should take stock,
animated inebriates unfairly jeer
goading on your primal fear:
blood-gargled your plaintive cry,
terrified eyes plead, mercy denied –
Christ for Spanish sadists died….
But where your creator now –
back on farm with calf and cow?
Flagged blades decorate your spine,
wounded, kneeling sacrifice, supine;
last gasp, silver cord snapped,
sword thrust: conquered, capped;
dead beast dragged, arena clapped.
blood graffitti curdles on hot sand
mutely crying for justice to stand;
I see Franco slyly smile, dry-eyed,
indifferent Iberia, justice denied
excepting contrarian Catalan
bull-baiting there under a ban;
“Prou!” states Bible and Quran….
Animal rights activists in Spanish Catalonia gathered signatures to force the regional parliament to debate a ban on bull-fighting.They campaigned under the platform “Prou!”, or, “Enough!” in Catalan.
