Origin Of Poetry: The Savage Beginnings Poem by Raj Arumugam

the primitives, the savages, the precursors, the ancestors
they crossed the savannahs
and the wild mountains and the fractured earth;
they hid in caves and shrank in fear in the midst of strange cries
and in the midst of swift, abrupt monsters that raged in the dark
and that disappeared with the young;
and in the day
they plucked berries and dug into flesh
and threw rocks on beasts
and licked the blood off maimed creatures
and bit into the raw breasts of such victims
and washed the fetuses in springs
before feeding their own living young;
they ate, they secured themselves
and the male and female of the savages had ferocious sex
and there was infanticide, and there was incest
and each slept, each seemingly satisfied:
on one such night
she woke alone and she saw the bodies all around her;
and she heard the gnashing and the groans and
a man half asleep, afraid and in pain; and she could smell the urine and the stench of a dying elder
and she saw the saliva and the unruly armpits and the exposed groins
and she was filled with fear
with the helplessness
and only disgust stayed awake with her;
and she walked to the mouth of the cave and she saw the moon
and in her loneliness
and in her meaninglessness
she gazed at the gentle light:
she knew this; she had felt this many times:
a song was born in her heart –
a song without music, a lyric without words…
thus began poetry