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Best Poems Written by Shenita Etwaroo

Below are the all-time best Shenita Etwaroo poems as chosen by PoetrySoup members

Details | Shenita Etwaroo Poem

The Pincushion

For decades you’ve used our bodies as your pincushion 
Poking, prodding, cutting, and killing. 
Forcing us to be your experimental subjects 
Scraping, shocking, drugging, and drilling.

Locking us up in meager dwellings 
Filthy, restrictive, desolate, and cramped. 
Filling me with toxins, chemicals, and poisons 
Upon my skin a brand is painfully stamped.

My skin burns as you cover me with makeup and creams. 
My muscles ache with each electrical shock. 
My brain no longer functions as it should 
You’ve carelessly destroyed my biological clock.

You alter the very DNA that nature gave me 
I was not created for misery and imminent death. 
Are the answers to your scientific questions 
Really worth taking my very last breath?

Stop using me as your puppet, pincushion, and servant 
Treat me with kindness, compassion, and respect 
With all the advances to technology these days 
Surely you could find an alternative subject.

Details | Shenita Etwaroo Poem

She

She huddles against the grit of a brick wall, 
In the grime of the alleyway, 
Unable to keep warm, 
The knife of hunger in her belly, 
Too tired to look for food. 
A stranger walks by, frowns at her, 
His lip curled, 
And her instinct is to run 
Before she is struck again, 
Simply for living on the streets. 
Every now and then, someone kind 
Will give her a scrap of food, 
Even say something in a warm tone 
That makes her feel less like 
Garbage scattered across the alley 
That she calls home. 
  
She often wonders if her situation 
Would be considered any more tragic 
If she were a human being starving in the cold.

Details | Shenita Etwaroo Poem

Cry of the Innocent

On blankets of snow 
Carcasses of my siblings lay. 
I watch you now 
Walk away.

Moments ago, 
Your greedy eyes, knives, 
Merciless shadow 
Had snatched their lives.

As you merry about 
The cozy fur and trophy heads 
I prepare to ready the shroud 
Tears piling around in hundreds.

Justice waits for you…

Justice of nature…

A world dry of animals, foliage, and hue– 
Nature’s punishment for our blunder.

Details | Shenita Etwaroo Poem

I Am More

I am more than a genetically modified organism 
That was constructed for scientific research. 
I am more than just pretty colors and silly talking tricks 
Caged upon this perch.

My body was created for a purpose 
Other than your dinner plate. 
Why must you kick and hit, scream and scold 
Then lock me for hours in this lonely crate?

My soul cries out as I am forced to work 
Beyond my strength and will. 
Although I push with all my might, 
You are only standing still.

I am more than just a breeding factory 
Giving birth to endless brood. 
Only for my children to be torn from me 
And sold away as food.

How would you feel if someone cut away your hair 
And turned it into a coat? 
Only for a thoughtless soul 
To parade around and gloat.

That overpriced purse you clutch 
Was constructed from my skin. 
For years I’ve been living in restrictive pain. 
I’m starting to wear thin.

I’m more than your convenience 
Your entertainment or nutrition. 
I have feelings. I have desires. 
I even have ambition.

Details | Shenita Etwaroo Poem

I Saw

I saw a dog one day, as I walked down the block, taking my exercise for the day. 
I saw a dog one day, chained in my neighbor’s yard. 
I jogged past a dog one day, hearing his bonds clink as he trotted 
To the edge of his confinement to sniff curiously my way. 
I saw the dog again and again, my breaths quick and shallow, 
Barely registering his dark brown fur, 
The pink tongue that hung gracelessly from his mouth 
As he panted in the heat. 
I try not to look at the dog as I jog by, 
I try not to notice the hissing grass and harsh sun 
He is not sheltered from. 
I try not to notice the mats in his fur 
Or the shiny reflectiveness of empty metal bowls 
Meant to feed and refresh him. 
  
I look for the dog as I jog past his owner’s house, 
Noticing at once his absence 
When he was no longer there to try 
So painstakingly to ignore. 
I slow down by his house every day, 
Eyes scanning the yard, 
But even the chain is gone, 
The soil disrupted from where the stake was 
Wrenched from the Earth. 
  
I try not to notice the dog-sized mound 
In the side of my neighbor’s yard. 
I jog faster and faster past their home everyday. 
I try not to think of how long the dog has been gone. 
I try not to think of what I could have done, 
Try not to think of the water bottle in my hand, 
The one I always carry, 
And how easy it would have been 
To give the poor creature a drink 
In the exhaustive heat 
That surely created the dog-sized mound 
In the side yard of my neighbor’s home.

Details | Shenita Etwaroo Poem

The Voices That Cannot Speak

If you had the chance to hear them 
Would they be asking you why? 
Would they want to know what they did wrong: 
Why they deserve to die?

If you had the chance to hear them 
Would they tell you they’re in pain? 
Being taken in this awful way 
Is cruelty ever sane?

Some may feel these animals may pass 
For food, or even fur 
But can there be any explanation 
As torture occurs?

Every day innocent animals 
Are taken from their grace 
No concern about their comfort 
Just tossed all over the place

Have you ever had a pet yourself 
Someone you called your own? 
Would it be acceptable for one 
To take them from your home?

Think about how your own pet would feel 
Or any you may know 
Think about what they would say to you 
Before they were to go

If these voices could speak to us now 
They might apologize 
Though not knowing what they did was wrong 
Through sadness in their eyes.

Details | Shenita Etwaroo Poem

No Gears

There are no gears beneath my fur, 
no wires 
no batteries 
no computer chips.

Underneath, I am made 
of muscles 
heart 
brain 
blood, 
the very same parts 
that you are made of.

I am not a machine 
but a living being 
with all the senses 
and feelings 
that life has given me

My muscles can ache 
my heart feel love 
my brain think 
my blood flow

If you touch me, 
I feel it. 
If you scold me, 
I hear it. 
If you love me, 
I know it.

Before you abuse me, 
run experiments, 
or use me as food, 
please remember 
that I can feel too.