Do you think they really saw rhinos and thought they were unicorns?
Were manatees ever really mermaids?

I heard doves in the early morn hooting and wanted to believe that a glorious predator could exist outside my urban balcony.
I saw killdeer swimming over distant lights. Their call and nightly presence convinced me that I was lucky enough to behold bats.

It was a weakness in me
To believe that I would
Witness something special
When my suffering
My poverty
My malformed cognitive processes
Were all common

I saw bats an hour before twilight feast on pests as I walked to the arcade.
I saw a barn owl not a mile from my old bed watching the grass for rabbits.
I have seen both manatee and rhinoceros bound by prisons.
We tell children they are luxurious for the animals in their zoo, but three months of isolation almost broke our society and still we pretend that an enclosure can be a comfort.

I wasn't special then
I am forgettable now
if doves can be owls
maybe I can be loved