She patiently lies on a blanket of marble. Her shot mother’s face on a bodiless skin splayed out on the floor beside her. Still as the other exhibits which adorn the room. Extensions of a two-legged ego. Her motionless tail pretends: I have forgotten who I am. Her silent lips reassure: You are my father. You are my master. As a chunk of death is tossed her way the metal arm that holds her chain wriggles like blades of grass in the wind. An emerald paradise that for two tiny months had belonged to her. She knew it never would again. Self-emancipation always had a cost, and the world had so many guns, and so many people who were yearning to use them. But she would rather die as a tiger, than as his plaything―and leaping above into a higher air, she makes a first and final kill. Amy Akiko is an educator, artist and writer from South London. Her writing predominately gravitates towards the themes of nature, love and (all too often) heartache, and …