ME, LAST YEAR; 58th Installment

 

“Look, Mom”, I said and I was hardly able to talk, me and Jennifer were laughing so much, even though she was worried about Lumpy. “Look how stupid they look. They think they’re scaring the daylights out of Jennifer’s pig! I guess they just don’t realize how silly they look, waggling their bottoms like that, clicking their teeth. They’re a pair of clowns!”

“Ah, they’re exercising territorial imperative”, Mom said. Like she had just had a conversation with them, and knew all about it.

“What’s that, Mrs. Feldman?” Jennifer asked. I wouldn’t have. I wouldn’t give Mom the satisfaction of wanting to know. She doesn’t have to talk like that, so no one can understand.

“Well Jennifer, an animal feels very possessive of what he considers to be his personal territory. When a strange animal comes on the scene, most particularly onto the first animal’s territory, the first animal instinctively wants to protect his property rights.”

“Boy, how stupid can you get? It’s our property, not theirs. We just let them live here.”

“Don’t be silly, dear. You know perfectly well what I mean.”

“Do you think it’s all right for them to be together like this then, Mrs Feldman? Will they get friendly after a little while longer?"

“Probably, Jennifer. What I think would be a much better idea is to put them all on neutral territory. It’s very nice out now, all you need is your sweater. Why not take them into the backyard on the grass, so they can forget territorial hostilities? Then perhaps they’ll be more friendly to one another.”

“Okay, that’s a good idea, eh Jennifer?” I said. And she thought so too. So we did. I mean, we took the three of them outside and I made a little pen for them to stay in out of the old croquet hoops, and the short garden fencing.

But wouldn’t you know it, they just started to ignore each other! All the stupid - oh, pardon me, they’re not really stupid (not much!) - well, all they wanted to do was eat and eat and nibble on the grass, nothing else. Just like pigs. Not very sociable, actually. Very appropriately named, you might say.

“Hey, how would you like to see how I trained Lumpy?” Jennifer asked.

“Trained? You trained her to do something? My dad says Guinea pigs are too stupid to be trained to do anything but eat … and poop. But they do that naturally.”

“No, honestly. I’ve trained her to run after me. It didn’t take all that long, either. Whenever I take her out of her cage and put her down outside or something, like it’s somewhere that she doesn’t recognize, she’ll run after me. I taught her when she was small. Actually, I didn’t exactly teach her so much, it was just that the first few times she just kind of followed me. Now it gets so that if I move away and call her, she’ll come over. Or, if she doesn’t notice that I’ve gone away and then she doesn’t know where I am, I’ll call her and she follows my voice to get to me.”

“Hey, cool! Let’s see her do it, Jennifer.”

So she took Lumpy out of the wire enclosure and took her over to the middle of the backyard,and put her down. At first Lumpy just sat there, not even moving or anything. Then she put her head down and just started eating like she was starved, or something. Jennifer walked away and nothing happened, her pig just kept eating.

“Oh, darn. Sometimes she doesn’t notice. Like when she’s busy, eating.”

“That’s like always. They’re always busy eating.”

“No, really Jen, she does run after me. Wait a minute, you’ll see.”

“C’mon Lumpy, Lumpy, c’mon!”

Just when it looked like Jennifer was going to get mad at poor little Lumpy and I was ready to laugh it off, wouldn’t you know it, the little pig started waddling off in her direction with her head down, sniffing the grass. She was running in little spurts and twice stopped and did a little hop and a skip.

I just love it when they frolic like that. Munchkin and Grumpkin used to do that a lot when they were babies. Now they don’t do it so much. They’re getting to be old grumps. Just like kids playing, and then growing up to be serious people. 

 

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All things in good time
and good things are timeless
as in 'for everything there is a season'.
For me, finally getting around to
that incomparable raconteur
the late Pierre Berton's tome
on The Quest for the North West Passage
and The North Pole, 1818 - 1909
"The Arctic Grail", that time was
long in coming. But it did arrive.

The fly page attests to the loving
gift this fascinating account represented
with its inscription: "Daddy, we hope you
enjoy reading this. I know how much you
enjoy history and I thought you might
like to take this along on your trip for
those quiet moments when you are up
and everyone else is asleep. Mimi, Sept. 1989."

Mimi might be offended that it has taken me
two decades to get around to her offering.
This touching family portrait, this brief sketch
of cherished parent, loving daughter might be
thought of as nostalgic familial memorabilia and indeed
it touches me, when I read and re-read it on
first paging through this fascinating volume.

We could not imagine divesting ourselves of books
once read, but of continuing value; mementos of
time, space, history, geography and the fertility
of authors' brain trusts, those whose literary muse
has been refined and lavished on those like us, for the
gratification of the vast public devoid of such talent.
Our bookshelves are pleasantly refulgent with
testimonies to past indulgence. Few books we have
read do not now reside there in a position of respect.

Vast are those books in number that we have acquired
over the decades, as yet unread, despite our diligent
determination to educate, entertain and lose ourselves
in accounts of the past, records of the present, hypothesis
of the future. Yet someone appears to have had little
enough personal book-indulgence as to place this gem
outside their realm of recovery, as a second-hand purchase
for us, and others appreciative of these opportunities
to acquire that which others so carelessly discard.

We are left to wonder: who is Mimi? Where did Daddy
venture on his trip ... a sea voyage to the Galapagos
perchance? 

 

 

Settling Into Winter

 

Wickedly bad tempered of late
she has sent one of her acolytes
to vent his ill tempest upon us
simply to remind, lest we forget
what forces they are that obey
Nature, corresponding to our
frail-minded clinging to puny
humankind's feeble management.

That ill wind, in intense
intercourse with a tempestuously
plunging atmosphere, and a
side dalliance with those
battered, bruised clouds venting
vapour over the land
has us cringing in paroxysms
of mortal distaste.

Trees surrender to naked despair.
Fish dive deep and anxiously hover.
Birds make frantic haste
to leave this familiar space.
While insects burrow deep
to wait out the annual tantrum.

Creatures of the forest gather
what they may to make
themselves scarce as the
landscape inexorably alters. We
grimace at the discomfort of
increasing displays of distemper.

Cringe before her directed onslaughts
of frigid air, wild wind, icy sleet, rain
and snow. Like other animals
we wait out the angry funk.
Awaiting opportunity to resume
the ease of changeable
Nature's goodly graces. 

 

 

A Tale of Two Walls

 

Unexpectedly, spectacular in its bitter resolve
to remain there, squatting mercilessly
as the symbol of irreconcilability
it suddenly, miraculously imploded on itself
collapsing, leaving a host of dazzled
confused, triumphant prisoners
to emerge, the light of freedom realized
settling into consciousness like the
heavens themselves revealed. Free at last.

Echoes of another, earlier release
from brutal bondage barely recognized
memories of the living dead released
from death camps. How precise is this irony
that the murderously irenic-averse
population complicit with the annihilation
of the pestilential Jews among them
suffered themselves a dim shadow of the
relentlessly mortal agony of official genocide.

The cleansing of the community
the nation, the continent and ultimately
the world, of the existence of predatory
power-assertive, controlling Jews.
Shakespeare would have thrilled to
this moral dilemma, the bleak humour
the black destiny, the upheaval
and the clever disposal of so many
throwaway lives, from infants to
three-legged doddering babblers.

Yet another anniversary; that which presaged
the cruel turmoil, the incessant slaughter
signified by shards of gleaming glass, goes
yet unacknowledged. There are the usual
preliminary dark clouds gathering on the
endless horizon of man's inhumanity to its own.
Another Kristallnacht abetted by the demonic
slander that soils the atmosphere. Perish
the very thought! But all the symptoms, the
signposts point unerringly there.

The dissenters - all those whose livid hatred
of surviving world Jewry become now citizens
of their very own land, their sovereign country -
speak of their own truth; their resurgent bigotry
has found its very own theme to augment
The Protocols, with another wall of desperation.
This one separating not a single nation with
polarizing ideologies, but two separate nations
one of which designs to obliterate the other
while proclaiming itself the sad victim, the
other the evil damned-by-acclamation occupier. 

 

 

Our Selves

Suspended in the primal aqueous
security of our mothers' wombs
we take presence in the genetic soup
that forms us, absorb our mothers'
plaintive whispers of accented fear
experience beyond memory the pain
and anguish that will mark our days.

Leavened by primordial nature's
ever-evolving displays of being
and the opportunities we are enjoined
to grasp, complementing destinies
fulfilling souls' desires. In the process
finding elusive pleasures. Discovering
possibilities, clasping them close
and in a lifetime hurling ourselves
into the future, the reality of life.

Neatly side-stepping when we may
the imperial realities of all existence that
inform and forewarn us, even while
we studiously look elsewhere
preferentially remain oblivious
to that long and steady journey
an imperative we cannot deny.

But then, why linger on the distant
inevitability when we can take comfort
in the meaningful present. Impressions are
what form our memory, our being,
clasped close to the heart of who we are.
While we are here, the who and what we
are is what must consume our being. 

 

 

A Plenitude of Gifts

 

There is a gossamer fragility
to the early morning sun sending tentative
filaments of light through the forest
emptied of its canopy
on this late winter day. That old
Master Craftsman has ventured
from his faraway hills to try his
creative hand at sculpting.

Frost delicately etches this landscape.
Priceless crystals rest upon leafage
encrusting the forest floor
where sun's fingers emblazon them
with an exquisite fire.
Wherever the eye strays
on bark, a revealed trail, lichen
fungi or wind-tossed branches
all carefully limned, white-washed.

Strands of glistening white ice
intertwine robustly as though carelessly
flung over fallen twigs. A magical display
soon to dissolve as the sun gains confidence
warmth, resolve. Then, crystals disappear
and all remains washed, brightening
faded glory of early spring tinctures.

A raven, silent and wide-winged
passes above, settles quietly
crowning the mast of an ancient pine.
Nuthatches call, flitting among
chattering chickadees. Squirrels
begin their quotidian treasure hunt
foraging, scrabbling, harassing one

another, intent on winter survival.

 

 

Introspection

 

Just into her teens
she is already struggling
with the perversity of
human relations, the sad
and pernicious disabilities
that young people cling to
refusing to clarify their own
thoughts, synthesize information
to reach intelligible and
just conclusions.

Why, she wonders,
speaking to her Jewish
grandparents, would some of her
classmates confidentially whisper
that Hitler was really a Jew?

And how strange it is that a
longtime friend whom she has
regularly helped deliver papers
expects her help, yet never
acknowledges it, by a nod
of appreciation?

And how confusing it is when
she cannot speak to a friend
about things that bother
for fear of offending
yet others exhibit no
such inhibitions?

Why is it that those who
are not team players
still claim their share of
a team's efforts?

And how odd it is that a friend
who never returned a
valued book, remarked in
astonishment "you already
had that one", seeing a
replacement hugged close;
no acknowledgement of her
casual shrugged "lost it".

And after all, shouldn't friends
be devoted to one another?
Able to speak with trust
and confidence, feeling
they will be understood,
trust reciprocated?

Is this carefully choreographed
dance of artful neglect friendship?

Long possessed of a healthy
sense of natural justice
evidence of the ignorance of
rudeness, incivility and bigotry
offend and perplex her.

Her future ambition: law and justice.