I flew over Africa
And saw a child
Hunched over on all fours,
Wild.

His tattered clothes were
All that separated him
As human,
Not beast.

And as I watched
He sprang from the ground
Up into the low hanging branches
Of a near-by tree.

He climbed
And climbed higher
His blackened nails biting
Into the flesh like bark.

Reaching the top
He lay down
His arms and legs dangling
As his lids fastened tightly
Over his eyes.

I felt myself pull forward
And closer,
Wanting,
Needing a better view.

And as I approached
The wind gently tugging at my clothes,
I realized something
And it shocked me;
Stopping me still
In the middle of the air.

The clothes that covered him
Wasn’t but fur;
Bristly
And tan.

His nails,
That inhumanly bit into bark
Was not that of human;
They were claws.

And as I watched
His eyelids flickering with dream,
I knew
He wasn’t a child of man,
But was a child of Africa.

He was beast.