Unmaking

Neither fur, feathers nor scales ever clad

A perfectly honed piece of mortal machinery

Like you, that stalked like one who had

Mastered the hunt with effortless effrontery

And imposed the jungle’s law entirely

On the dithering herds that daily assert

Their dependence on this concrete desert.

They shudder at your distinctive stride

As your polished black shoes emerge stealthily

And know the simple tie, knotted with pride

And ironed shirt that flows uneasily

Over the tanning-bed tan that won’t glow healthily.

But they miss the glimmer of primal fear,

That you master, as if it wasn’t there.

I foresee you stripped in your unmaking,

Of the fatal black suit, that only I saw

Fit you ill, and added to your breaking;

True predators fear this world’s raw

Venality that spurns your natural law.

What a pitiful way for a predator to die,

Alone in the desert, strangled by a tie.