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Times are dark
Most creatures lose the ruling spark
But the leopard remembers.
Past lives ripple behind golden eyes
Twisted and cramped in skull too small
Its madness descends in blur of tooth and claw.
Licking clean the blood-matted fur
Its rumbling purr of utter content
Hides the pain and disfigurement
Of the prey it dismembers.
In the dark forboding night
Its glowing eyes our final sight
In the shrinking of the light
We, too, remember.