Dinner Time!

‘Twas a cold and wintry night
In the grasslands of Serengeti
Where the gazelles pranced
The meerkats danced
And the elephants stomped mightily.
Hyenas and jackals you will find,
Cheetahs chasing wildebeest
And if you’re hit by something from up above,
Blame the baboons on the tree.
Everyone in the forest it seemed,
Got along quite merrily.
But the Queen among them certainly was
The mighty Lioness who walked free.

One glance of hers set the gazelles prancing
The cheetahs regarded her respectfully.
Her gaze quieted the hyenas’ laughing,
(Whom she’d walk past quite regally)
The birds heralded her arrival
With their incessant twittering-
And a mighty roar she’d roar sometimes
To send those pachyderms packing.

But I digress, I digress.
Gentle reader, my apologies.
Easy it is to get carried away
Singing the glories of Her Majesty.
But focus I must and tell you instead
This tale I have to tell.
A tale of hunger, a tale of sadness
A tale of fulfillment as well.

‘Twas a cold night in Serengeti
For Her five cubs in their den
They huddled and they shivered
As the wind howled through the fen.
The little cubs looked about them
And wondered where their Mother was-
They played a bit, they pranced a bit
But soon sat down, sad and still.
The dreary wind blew in, you see,
And gave their hearts a chill.

For seven days and nights our Empress
Had been out on the prowl
For seven nights and days she’d stalked
The wary gazelle crowd.
(The baboons kept blurting out, you see,
Where her form she’d hide)
But our Lady had her means and ways,
She took things in her stride.
She made her kill, she ate her fill
And strolled back to her pride.

Back in the den the cubs heard their Mother
The excitement made them dizzy
They zoomed and zammed this way and that-
Life now seemed quite easy.
The chill air bothered them less
Their bellies even lesser
Mother was coming, they thought and thought,
Oh how gleefully would they greet her!

But set our gaze to the East we shall
To far away Judaea
Where a descendant of Solomon had, unfortunately,
Fallen ill with Malaria.
Physicians came from far and wide
Their dresses were all very curious
But sagely sad they nodded their heads
And proclaimed this case quite serious.

“Oh King, Oh King”, they said to him.
“Pay heed to our counsel.
Gravely ill you are it seems,
This malady saps strangely at your core.
Drink to your fill the milk of a Lioness
To balance your humours once more.”
The King nodded absently, his hands upon his chin.
Half his Treasury would be the reward,
To he that found Him this medicine.

The Heralds blew their bugles loud
The message rang far and wide
But none but one came about
Who was both daring and quite wise.
“For His Majesty’s Grace, it is but I
Who to His need shall rise!”
Saying so he set bravely forth
After this treasured prize.

Through hill and dale he journeyed
Across Bethlehem, Araby and Sinai
But he didn’t rest until he found
The dwellings of the Masai.

Ten and two lambs he’d brought away
All the way from home
Ten and two lambs accompanied him
Although they had no wool to comb.
He’d planned each day to offer one
In front of our Lady’s place.
Her Majesty certainly had no qualms
About getting food without a chase
She had hungry mouths feed,
Both hers and her cubs.
(Although, you know, she could do
With few nice belly rubs)
Wise and daring our hero was,
He obliged humbly and with haste-
And so it wasn’t long before
He’d won our Majesty’s grace.

“Pleased with you, I am indeed,
(Although your service has been a tad slow)
Ask of me a boon, kind Sir
And I shall make it so.”
Thusly spoke her Majesty
To our daring hero.

“Oh great and powerful Empress,
What more can this mortal ask?
From Her on whose word alone
This mighty forest runs!
I look upon you as my Mother
And wish only that you accept me
As one of your long lost sons!”

The Empress nodded, her eyes half closed
She felt quite sleepy and calm
The past few days certainly had been nice
And this breeze was a soothing balm.
Forty winks can’t take too long,
Thinking thus she slept-
While our roguish hero saw his chance-
And towards the cubs, crept.

The runt of the litter he took in his hands
Dislodged him from his mother’s glands
A calfskin sack he filled with milk
And went swiftly back to his lands.

How his king greeted him
And whether he won the wager
That tale my friend, is for a different time
One I shall sing of, later.
But for now we shall turn our sights
Back to this lair of Mother’s
And on the tiny cub who was so cruelly dislodged
From his rightful place by his brothers.

The tiny cub wandered
He chased after a mouse
When it rained he shivered and quivered
And tried to go into a house.
The children tried to play with him
“We found a stray cat!”, they’d shout.
But seeing him the Lady could but scream
And her husband chased him out.

On and on he walked until
Upon a meadow he chanced
Fluffy white sheep grazed near the hill
And a couple of lambs pranced.

Our cub walked up to them
And ran about faster and farther
The delighted lambs made friends with him
And took him to their Mother.
The kindly ewe regarded him
With her one good eye
In him but a babe she saw
And accepted him as her child.

And so by and by our cub grew up
Grazing upon grass and hay
He thought himself as a sheep
For he’d seen no other way.

Until one day, a wolf came upon
The pasture where they were grazing
He howled a most a terrible howl
And set our sheep friends trembling.

Our sheepish lion looked about him
He regarded his adoptive Mother
With frightened eyes she huddled between
Two others and his brother.

Seeing thus, our erstwhile lion
Began indeed to despair
He felt afraid, and he saw afraid-
As the wolf snatched his brethren by pairs.

But when the wolf tried to snatch
His mother in his jaws
Our hero, the sheepish lion felt
A surge within his paws.
His nostrils flared, his nails came bared
A fire lit up in his core
Through his maws he now let out
A most terrifying roar.

He remembered, he remembered
The memories came rushing back
Of his childhood, and the days he treasured
Nestled in his Mother’s lap.

The wolf was surprised indeed, to find
A lion amongst the sheep
Tail tucked, he made good his escape,
And ran swiftly back to his kind.

Did our Lion turn against his brethren?
Or did he become a Shepherd,
Ever watchful and vigilant?
How did his brothers fare?

That story, and many others, my friend
Is yours to weave- with love and care.

Picture: Gal Shapira,  “Brown Lion Cub Lying on the Ground”