God Gave This Prey Four Horns Like Jacob Sheep
by Sabrina Dawkins
From that other world,
the good son and father
Malcolm X, regenerated Adam,
told me at the hotel ticket booth,
where perhaps athletes go
for one-night unawares prostitutes,
that I was in a jungle.
I am an antelope
resting in the field.
Father God gave me four horns
for reinforcement.
When wild black or grey dogs charge,
I close my eyes
and pray to God
they don’t attack.
When I open them
the front horns
pierce one-fourth the chest
of a man
with a James Earl Jones tan.
My television,
with cartoon colors,
turned a hunting beast
that would tear me on instinct
into a hero, Mufasa, the lion king
who talks, is selfless,
protects, has morals,
but will charge the glass
at the zoo repeatedly
with no success
because there’s prey
on the other side relaxed.
Could Mufasa be a football star?
Only the TV glass protects
from Mufasa or Darth Vader,
single-minded predators
with artificial layers,
dimensionalized by dialogue or monologue
in TV interviews.
But that predatory stare
from human eyes across the table
lets me know
the jungle bleeds into
the human world.
TV’s American Psycho
turns psychopathic killers into
handsome bachelors
and millionaires.
And I really believed Frank Lucas
was Denzel Washington
and that Mufasa
would’ve made a better king than Scar.
But remove TV glass
and you will see
a beast is a beast.
And they know who we are:
weak prey filled with TV lies,
no horns or antlers,
no thick hide.
We are silly women
who will walk alone with him,
who’s 6’5
and muscular.
But we have no protective pads
to fight against
a trained competitor
in a dark room
after alcohol’s consumed
and we are incapacitated
when he decides to wrestle
like Nate Parker;
we’re deer at rest with no antlers
or horns or helmet.
So the Holy Spirit removed
TV-induced disarmament
and replaced it with
four horns.
I no longer see good intentions
in beast predators disguised as men.
And those horns were His angels:
Jacob as Michael,
Adam as Gabriel.