A thought-provoking free verse poem inspired by the 2008 situation in Kenya.

There is no depravity so vile,
so heinous that Mankind
won’t commit it, be it
murder, genocide, child abuse,
torture, assorted mayhems,
anything imaginable in Hell,
like the gang raping of women
ongoing in Kenya at present.

This same Man is capable of great
kindness and touching gentleness
that springs from his ability to love,
nurture, and protect others.
How can these two opposites
exist within the same vessel?

Mankind comes by it naturally.
Like the lion, Man is but a beast,
a beast dedicated to survival of his
progeny above all others.
He can hold his own dear, while
burning with disdain for the family
of any others, who are his non-self.
Under it all, it is the preservation of
one’s own DNA which is the
unspoken motivator of Man’s
existence and his actions.

The male lion that displays loving
gentleness with his own cubs,
letting them bite his ears and swat his tail,
is the same lion that, as the newly won
pride leader, savagely murdered all
the pride’s cubs sired by the displaced
leader so that all the lionesses would
soon be receptive to his seed
and his DNA would live on
in all their newborn cubs.

Beneath the veneer of civilization
and sophistication, this rule of Nature
still runs deep within Mankind.
The one true golden rule is
ensure the survival of bearers
of your DNA. All else is subject
to apathy or contempt.
In Nature, Man and lion are both
simply beasts, and a beast dwells
in each. The scientist in me sees
and understands this.

The poet in me has grown old and
disillusioned waiting for the hand
of God to modify Mankind’s
vicious nature and put an end
to all the genocides, to all the raping,
and to all the atrocities that abound.
I fear Mankind shall forever remain
simply a brutal beast of Nature.