Post by yukarana on Jan 28, 2010 13:26:05 GMT -5
This is a fiction story exploring what might go through the mind of a tiger kept in captivity.
My soul is a jungle, a mass of vivid green stretching upwards and outwards beyond the realm of vision. The very essence of life resides there, in that place called Wilderness, more than any other place on earth. For years, this place was my home. I never understood that other worlds were possible, or that anything else existed, for one simple reason: I had never needed to.
Long ago, I was run down by a monster in the sky, which chased faster than any beast I have ever encountered. The chase was short. Its venomous bite defeated me. When I woke, Wilderness had vanished.
Motion, chill and grey and a thousand terrible scents and sounds assailed me from every side. The floor shook like stone beneath the pressure of a quake. I roared and fought against the cold walls of the beast's belly. I screamed that no tiger should be made to die as prey; that no prey should be kept alive for so long. Whatever was out there could not hear my anger, or did not listen. That was the day I first knew fear.
Much time passed, and all was still for a while. A two-legged animal with strange and vivid fur left an unfamiliar carcass in my cage, which I ignored until hunger drove me to it. Eventually, the beast's great belly trembled: we were on the move again.
I understood little of what was happening to me. One bright day, the belly of the beast sprang open—and my senses were overloaded with a freakish mix of familiarity and strangeness. I was afraid, yet eager to reacquaint myself with Wilderness and all I knew as home. I would announce my victory from the highest hill! No beast alive could contain me.
I stepped out, and confirmed my worst doubts. Wilderness was not there. I froze in mid-step, tasting the foreign air. A tall, straight cliff emerged from the ground in all directions, closing me in. There was a puddle of drinking water in a stone pit, several small trees of a kind I'd never seen, and a tall structure made from branches—which provided the only protection from the weak but glaring sun.
Clear stone embedded in the eerie mountain allowed a herd of two-legged animals to see me. Some of them would stand for hours, mocking me from their freedom. I charged at the walls, tore at the earth, tackled the trees. I shouted and threatened the unknown animals. The sheer stone allowed for no grip, and my attempts did nothing but draw more of them, to make flashes and strange noises at me.
Time dulled the edge of my fury. I saw that no amount of fighting was going to change my situation—and since then, have endeavored to make myself used to it. I tried to forget Wilderness. It is harder than one might think—for my spirit itself is made of Wilderness, and every night I return there in my dreams. I pad across a shadowed stream, pausing to drink water that is cool and fresh, then to flex my paws against a leaning trunk. Old scents and familiar sounds rattle in the dense growth. For just a beat, I am as free as a bird of the skies, soaring with inexpressible joy—then the day cracks open, flooding my valley with cold white light.
My captors have filled this place with trees for me to climb, rocks to bask on and a pool to bathe in; they assume that I am pleased with this arrangement. Things are better than when I first came. However, the plants are still strange and the weather is cold. I spend my nights indoors, on a pile of dead grass, warm but little else. I am now housed with others of my kind: some who have never known a world outside, others who were stolen from their birthplace, as I was.
We, who long to be alone, to choose our own mates and roam where we please, face a lifetime of sharing a tiny, barren territory with strangers. Individuals come and go with the seasons. Time blurs into a mass of faceless years. New faces replace the old. Their presence is a constant ache, a pressing weight upon my mind. Scent is everywhere, sound is everywhere. We have no prey, no room to run and no hope of escape. The colors in the sky form patterns foreign to my mind; this is not the place where we belong. This is not our home.
Captivity dulls the urge to reproduce. Females bear cubs, but the young are ignored until they are taken away. The captive-born never learnt to care for cubs. Those whose native home was Wilderness eschew breeding, believing that cubs deserve better than this sterile life.
In their hearts, the captive-born know that something more exists—but never will they feel the caress of a dampened fern, the joy of learning to stalk prey, the pleasure and the pain of leaving their families to establish their own territories. They know the names of these things, but they will never have a memory of them. I have asked more than one if this life is better than no life, and all have failed to answer. We fight to stay alive because survival is the central drive of all living creatures. Regardless of hardship, we will never surrender this.
Stripped of all I once was, I embrace the only prospect left to me: I pace and remember. I think about the strangeness of those who watch us.
Although they walk free, and submit only to themselves, they appear as captives. I have never met a kind of beast which, when free to live, does not take great joy from life. With very few exceptions, these two-legged things seem not to match this.
Their bodies waste beneath the weight of fat and premature age, and in all but the cubs, the light of universal joy no longer lifts their faces. I can never know, but it seems that these beasts take their very existence for granted. Whilst we struggle just to be, they seem to slope through life with the least effort possible. Allowing their muscles to waste, their time to slip away, whilst they stand and stare at those whose freedom is lost for their sake.
Each one holds the key that could grant them freedom from this state, and they choose captivity. They are chased by time, and yet they have no fear of death. Freedom—that is, to embrace what being alive, here and right now, truly means—is too much like hard work.
Perhaps because of these things, the strangers think that captivity is something that all life should aspire to. Still, some of them must feel a longing for that place they barely know the name of. Some of them must know that this is wrong. Our soul is the jungle, our heart is the chase--and though we face a future sterile of either, we are still Wilderness inside.
My soul is a jungle, a mass of vivid green stretching upwards and outwards beyond the realm of vision. The very essence of life resides there, in that place called Wilderness, more than any other place on earth. For years, this place was my home. I never understood that other worlds were possible, or that anything else existed, for one simple reason: I had never needed to.
Long ago, I was run down by a monster in the sky, which chased faster than any beast I have ever encountered. The chase was short. Its venomous bite defeated me. When I woke, Wilderness had vanished.
Motion, chill and grey and a thousand terrible scents and sounds assailed me from every side. The floor shook like stone beneath the pressure of a quake. I roared and fought against the cold walls of the beast's belly. I screamed that no tiger should be made to die as prey; that no prey should be kept alive for so long. Whatever was out there could not hear my anger, or did not listen. That was the day I first knew fear.
Much time passed, and all was still for a while. A two-legged animal with strange and vivid fur left an unfamiliar carcass in my cage, which I ignored until hunger drove me to it. Eventually, the beast's great belly trembled: we were on the move again.
I understood little of what was happening to me. One bright day, the belly of the beast sprang open—and my senses were overloaded with a freakish mix of familiarity and strangeness. I was afraid, yet eager to reacquaint myself with Wilderness and all I knew as home. I would announce my victory from the highest hill! No beast alive could contain me.
I stepped out, and confirmed my worst doubts. Wilderness was not there. I froze in mid-step, tasting the foreign air. A tall, straight cliff emerged from the ground in all directions, closing me in. There was a puddle of drinking water in a stone pit, several small trees of a kind I'd never seen, and a tall structure made from branches—which provided the only protection from the weak but glaring sun.
Clear stone embedded in the eerie mountain allowed a herd of two-legged animals to see me. Some of them would stand for hours, mocking me from their freedom. I charged at the walls, tore at the earth, tackled the trees. I shouted and threatened the unknown animals. The sheer stone allowed for no grip, and my attempts did nothing but draw more of them, to make flashes and strange noises at me.
Time dulled the edge of my fury. I saw that no amount of fighting was going to change my situation—and since then, have endeavored to make myself used to it. I tried to forget Wilderness. It is harder than one might think—for my spirit itself is made of Wilderness, and every night I return there in my dreams. I pad across a shadowed stream, pausing to drink water that is cool and fresh, then to flex my paws against a leaning trunk. Old scents and familiar sounds rattle in the dense growth. For just a beat, I am as free as a bird of the skies, soaring with inexpressible joy—then the day cracks open, flooding my valley with cold white light.
My captors have filled this place with trees for me to climb, rocks to bask on and a pool to bathe in; they assume that I am pleased with this arrangement. Things are better than when I first came. However, the plants are still strange and the weather is cold. I spend my nights indoors, on a pile of dead grass, warm but little else. I am now housed with others of my kind: some who have never known a world outside, others who were stolen from their birthplace, as I was.
We, who long to be alone, to choose our own mates and roam where we please, face a lifetime of sharing a tiny, barren territory with strangers. Individuals come and go with the seasons. Time blurs into a mass of faceless years. New faces replace the old. Their presence is a constant ache, a pressing weight upon my mind. Scent is everywhere, sound is everywhere. We have no prey, no room to run and no hope of escape. The colors in the sky form patterns foreign to my mind; this is not the place where we belong. This is not our home.
Captivity dulls the urge to reproduce. Females bear cubs, but the young are ignored until they are taken away. The captive-born never learnt to care for cubs. Those whose native home was Wilderness eschew breeding, believing that cubs deserve better than this sterile life.
In their hearts, the captive-born know that something more exists—but never will they feel the caress of a dampened fern, the joy of learning to stalk prey, the pleasure and the pain of leaving their families to establish their own territories. They know the names of these things, but they will never have a memory of them. I have asked more than one if this life is better than no life, and all have failed to answer. We fight to stay alive because survival is the central drive of all living creatures. Regardless of hardship, we will never surrender this.
Stripped of all I once was, I embrace the only prospect left to me: I pace and remember. I think about the strangeness of those who watch us.
Although they walk free, and submit only to themselves, they appear as captives. I have never met a kind of beast which, when free to live, does not take great joy from life. With very few exceptions, these two-legged things seem not to match this.
Their bodies waste beneath the weight of fat and premature age, and in all but the cubs, the light of universal joy no longer lifts their faces. I can never know, but it seems that these beasts take their very existence for granted. Whilst we struggle just to be, they seem to slope through life with the least effort possible. Allowing their muscles to waste, their time to slip away, whilst they stand and stare at those whose freedom is lost for their sake.
Each one holds the key that could grant them freedom from this state, and they choose captivity. They are chased by time, and yet they have no fear of death. Freedom—that is, to embrace what being alive, here and right now, truly means—is too much like hard work.
Perhaps because of these things, the strangers think that captivity is something that all life should aspire to. Still, some of them must feel a longing for that place they barely know the name of. Some of them must know that this is wrong. Our soul is the jungle, our heart is the chase--and though we face a future sterile of either, we are still Wilderness inside.