Pegasus 2021-22

17 Hunting Bears

by Achilleas-Nikolaos Ververidis-Papakonstantinou I could never feel whole again.

After a life of hunting bears.

I have shot with my rifle: eleven Sun Bears, three Polar Bears, four Brown Bears, seven Grizzly Bears Now I can never feel the same.

My hands are trembling I am sorry for this.

This pen must be making a mess of the paper, carving an inky hole which I’ll clumsily clean with a tissue.

After all these years of hunting bears, retirement came smoothly.

I was visited by my old partner, Sun Hoon, Who told me many things, but one of them shook me deeply.

I remember something along the lines of: You are ridden with guilt, but don’t these furs make such a warm embrace during winter?

Sun Hoon, you fool! You don’t realize.

You’ve been a bear hunter for so long but you never noticed you were a bear too.