Bestiary for the End Times

The Last Sumatran Rhino in Malaysia (Malaysia)
“Wildlife officials in Malaysia are mourning the death of Iman, the country's last Sumatran rhino.” – CNN, November 24, 2019
 
The last Sumatran Rhino in Malaysia up and died
as wildfires snuffed the oxygen with the peatlands
 
drained and dried. The cancer in her ovaries put
too much pressure on her bladder; her caretakers
 
could only watch her fading, and grow sadder, as
four more Sumatran rhinos had succumbed the past four years
 
forcing rhino lovers everywhere to reckon with their fears.
Scientists had tried to breed her with an Indonesian male
 
but his sperm just wasn’t viable, her eggs were just too frail.
All but eighty of their cousins have already gone extinct
 
and the rest are either held in zoos or else are on the brink.
Their killers hunt them for their horns which act as medicine,
 
just like our hair and fingernails, composed of keratin, for fevers
or convulsions or they say, fertility, but I’d propose, if I could choose
 
to breed no more like me. I’d suggest its time we let the rhinos
have their turn – let’s us die off and give them space and
 
come back once we’ve learned. So ask me no more questions
and I’ll tell you no more lies, I propose we stop the show and
 
recognize our time to go
 before one more rhino dies.