Wisdom of the Chain
What is unchained will remain
— An ancient people of the burning bush proverb
Take a baby elephant,
around it’s leg wrap a heavy chain
Give the behemoth infant
one hundred feet of circular freedom
The young pachyderm will try repeatedly
to go beyond the chain’s reach
It’s exhausting, valiant efforts to roam free
will in the end be futile, resulting only
in the fetters bruising the elephant’s ankle
This lesson of pain
will embed itself into the
young elephant’s brain
Vain attempts to taste freedom will sour over time,
for the price of the struggle to gain liberty
will be measured in
strained metal links of frustrated suffering
The length of freedom is the distance from the baobab tree,
which is one hundred giant steps, and not an inch more
Then come the end of year two,
in the middle of the young elephant’s savannah sleep,
the chain is removed
Did the strapping behemoth dream that night that it was free?
When it arose having just a thin, light rope, the same length as the chain,
tied loosely around it’s ankle —
the elephant roared jubilantly
For even though it believed it was still firmly bound,
the young elephant was thrilled
at the easing of the new chain
And the lessening of the captive pain
Copyright © Freddie Robinson Jr. | Year Posted 2017
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