My name was never Bruce, that was penciled on the slate I was born without a lawyer in the waters off the state I admit I took some swimmers, I will not dispute the count But the film omitted context and exaggerated the amount Before one fin had broken through the surface of the bay Two notes declared me guilty and the jury looked away You entered where I hunted, then you called the hunt a crime And sold my final moments as the terror of its time JAWS: The Defamation Trial by orchestration One shadow underneath the foam And suddenly the sea was not my home No hearing, no appeal Just teeth upon the reel I was doing what the ocean made me do Then the whole world learned to hate me before the truth came through I was blown apart in public, let Exhibit B be shown Yet the next shark stood accused of crimes that were my own Same coastline, same silhouette, same music in the score So naturally the public said that Bruce had come for more No dental comparison, no witnesses, no remains Just guilt assigned by species and a soundtrack in their brains The crime was not that one shark killed, the larger claim became That every dorsal breaking water bore my face and name JAWS: The Defamation Species-wide damnation One fin appears, one trumpet moans And every living shark inherits all my bones No difference, no doubt You cast the whole sea out I thought the charge was mine alone to bear Then watched you teach your children that my kind was everywhere By chapter three my likeness was transported to a park Where tourists bought admission to observe a captive shark You hurled debris toward cameras, sold the terror in 3-D And called that depth of field a form of marine biology My offspring grew to buildings, crashed through glass on cue While men in cardboard goggles swore the spectacle was true The animal was gone by then, replaced by brand design I was no longer flesh and blood, I was a warning sign JAWS: The Defamation Retail predation My teeth were stamped on cups and shirts While every sequel made the facts progressively worse No habitat remained Just merchandise and blame I thought you feared the creature in the deep But you only needed something with a logo you could keep Then came the sworn absurdity you titled The Revenge A widow heard my family through some psychic signal range A shark pursued her aircraft to an island in the sun As though we study timetables and choose our prey for fun It understood vendettas, roared, and plotted like a man Then died by means no expert here can reasonably understand You asked the sea for vengeance, then assigned it human spite Because an uncaring ocean was too honest for the night JAWS: The Defamation Final accusation You never feared the teeth alone You feared a world that never could be owned So call me beast and curse my name Make nature carry human blame I was only hunger moving through the blue The monster was the story that you needed to be true For the record... I died in nineteen seventy-five. I did not return. I did not father a hereditary vendetta. I did not follow Ellen Brody to the Bahamas. I cannot read airline schedules. And sharks... Do not roar. This concludes my statement.
