Stephen R Coffee ©2005
Imagine you’re a cougar
with a cougar attitude
You slink along on padded paws,
you’d like to find some food
The bison and the antelope
The rabbit and the deer
Each one has a name for you
And every name means fear
One day you spy a creature
That you’ve never seen before
It walks upright on two legs
You wonder if there’s more
It wears the skins of animals
And decorates its face
This one could be dangerous
You’d better give it space
You run to the top of the highest ridge
Climb the highest tree
And the cougar bides its time
It watches the people come and go
From on high
A hundred centuries go by
And still you rule the land
Humans sometimes cross your path
But they know where they stand
Iroqouis, Algonquian
The Dogues and Manohoac
Each tribe has a name for you
And each name means respect
Then everything begins to changeYour world slips from your claws
Wave on wave of humans come
With wagons guns and saws
A man named Haycock claims your ridge
And cuts down all the trees
He plows the ground and plants some seeds
To feed his family
You run far away to the mountain west
Climb the highest tree
And the cougar bides its time
It watches the people come and go
From on high
From your rocky hiding place
You haunt the people’s dreams
They hear your eerie cry at night
And wonder what it means
Panther, puma, mountain lion
Each name breathed in fear
A cougar’s still a cougar
After all these years
Last week someone thought they saw
A big cat in the woods
But there aren’t any mountain lions
In our neighborhood
Then someone found a tuft of fur
And then there were the tracks
Is it really possible
The cougar’s coming back?
So you run to the top of Haycock Ridge
Climb the highest tree
And the cougar bides its time
It watches the people come and go
From on high
Yeah it’s watching everything we do
From on high