IF I WERE AN ANIMAL

If I were an Animal,
I would be different . . .

If you fed me, of course I'd return.

If you hit me once, I would forgive you.
But hit me twice, I might Reconsider.

If I were an Animal,

I would stop to smell the flowers
I would listen and become apart of the Wind.

I would hear the symphony of Silence
And
melt to the touch of a human that loved Me
more than it loved Itself.

If I were an Animal,

I'd watch every Dusk and Dawn from  the highest Mountain,
I would delight in the color of Seasons unfolding,
And taste the waves of Oceans beating.

If I were an Animal,

I would seek out my Kind and rejoice in them,
I'd ask nothing in return but to be with them.

As I grow old, they would help me hunt,
And lick the wounds on me that Life has left.

If I were an Animal

and you shot me, I'd try to understand
why I'd be so Afraid to see you again,

wondering if even you'd do it again
knowing you shot apart of Yourself.