This One's For You: For Hurricane Katrina’s Animal Victims and Human Rescuers
An Animal Rights Article from All-Creatures.org

FROM

Brenda Shoss, KinshipCircle.org
August 2009

August 29, 2005 marks the day Hurricane Katrina cast people and animals adrift in a sea of loss and despair. When the levees broke, a singular scream grew from dark waters, drowning out reason. Erasing hope.

Who would hear their cries, faint as ashes lost in fragments? Who would see their desperation -- locked behind doors, bound to fence posts, stranded on rooftops?

Thousands searched for familiar faces.
But eyes turned cloudy when no one came.
Huddled in bathtubs. Hidden behind walls.
A tail wagged...and a soft purr rose
from the rubble to merge with the wind.

Who would hear them?
Our government did not.
Who would see them?
Our law enforcers did not.
Who would return for them?

You did.

Who has no money, but jumped on a plane.
Drove cross-country, packed to the roof...
Because you were the one a dog needed
You were the hands a cat waited for
You were their food, their water, their love.

This is for you
Who read every word
Networked and planned
To salvage small hearts
Left in the storm.

This is for you
For every mile traveled
For every life saved.


Return to Animal Rights Articles