In the zoo
They gave him a cage
Circus put a sparkle
On his face
Away from life
The elephant walks
Shadow across a dream …Oh freedom
Lite a flame …
In “Lite a Flame,” Laura wrote about the heartbreak of elephants wrenched from their free lives and forced into cages, or killed for their ivory. A growing movement has taken root that has recognized the soul needs of elephants–who have very strong family systems, extreme sensitivity and high intellect along with their indelible memories–and is lobbying to remove them from zoos and circuses and send them to sanctuaries.
The biggest elephant sanctuary in the U.S. is in Hohenwald, Tennessee, and that’s where a 60-year-old Asian elephant named Shirley (my mother’s name, so she’s extra-special to me) has lived for the past 9 years. Before that, she spent 30 years in a circus, and then 20 years in a zoo where she was well cared for but the only elephant in residence.
In 2000, one part of a film called The Urban Elephant told the story of Shirley and her reunion with another elephant at the Tennessee sanctuary, Jenny. Watch the first part of their story above, then continue it here. If this doesn’t bring you to tears, you may not have a heart.
At The Elephant Sanctuary’s website, you can learn more about Shirley and her 13 other Asian sanctuary sisters, watch live images on the “Elecam,” and meet the 3 African elephants that reside in a separate section of the lush acreage. (Laura’s song is really about the larger-eared Africans–“the elephant of the plain”). In temporary residence there now, too, is a skin-and-bones male Asian, Ned, who’s recovering from neglectful treatment elsewhere and will eventually be sent to a sanctuary that accepts males (Hohenwald is strictly Big Girls Only).
Laura was an early visionary about the need to bridge the false separation between humans and animals. As she sang, oppression of animals is no different from that of people:
It’s like prejudice
For the color of your skin
Prejudice for a woman
Prejudice for an animal
Like the elephant of the plain
Heartbreaking.