“We are not angels, we are merely sophisticated apes. Yet we feel like angels trapped inside the bodies of beasts, craving transcendence and all the time trying to spread our wings and fly off, and it’s really a very odd predicament to be in, if you think about it.”
– V.S. Ramachandran
Fallen weaver nest made of moss, lichens, and polyester fiberfill. It’s full of the tiniest feathers.
The rain is here and the ground starts to exhale
people go about their business relieved, slightly quieter
And for all our long relationship with the land
the imposing of our limited and short-sighted human ideas
the endless fences
the concept of private property
imaginary lines in the sand
our furtive scrawling of ideas like (nation-state) over the deserts and mountains and plains
the maps we draw
the heartache and division it causes
the miles of concrete and razor wire
The clearcutting
the poisoning of oceans
the slicing clean of mountaintops
the pummeling and manipulation to force the land to yield
bigger faster better
the stripping of nutrients and minerals
of life-giving properties
the fields turned to dust
the shattered shale
the chemicals dumped into clean aquifers in the name of profit
For all these relative microabrasions that add up to one
howling worldwide wound
For all this we still do not control the sky
for all this
for all our clever predictive technology
the greenscreen weather maps
the meteorologist’s glistening dental veneers
the seed clouds
the attempts at papering over this expanse of blue with
slow-trolling airplanes pulling ads for car insurance
for all this
it is still a wild thing
still attempting to set a balance
shake off our cumulative damage
For all this we still have the farmer
the anxious hope
the straining to watch gathering clouds
the pleas and offerings to our various gods throughout millennia
of corn and harvest, water and sky
we still marvel
we still have some shred of wonder at late-season monster tornadoes and seven feet of upstate snow
at something far more powerful than ourselves
and some none-too-gentle reminder we are still so very small.
And for all this, regardless of what it means, I am grateful.
Rain like some mythical benediction, many miles to the north. About ten minutes later I hit a blowing dust storm and pulled over in Avenal, which seemed slightly nicer than the surrounding towns until I saw the giant megaprison that employs nearly everyone here since the farming dried up. I sat in a diner while the sun set and people wandered out to peer at the sky and, after a few drops hit the sidewalk then ceased, shuffled back to their business. After this I paid my tab and walked out into a stultifying night heavy with dogwood and diesel. It was time to go home.
Long Now, right now.
