Insufferable Insubordination

The ultimate order of power lies in the

capable hands of none other than nature

the ultimate creator. As vast as the universe

is it is in fact but a laboratory where nature

devises her scenarios, arranges chemicals

and mixes her uncountable elixirs to produce

galaxies, their suns and the planets that

revolve around them leading her to turn 

toward the micro-level of inspiring new life

forms upon them to study the properties that 

evolve and transform. On one planet alone

that we are most familiar with she has 

created and disposed of billions of living

species most found to bore her and thus quite

expendable leaving a remaining ten million

to prove their value to this most exacting of

creators who just happens to ferociously tend

to minute details in guiding her decisions. 

Much is known of human predecessors. Much

much more is unknown and will not be known

as nature afire with the spirit of creation

creates endlessly and disposes with casual

ease. She may now be bemused that the

upstart human race has evolved as a most

impudent and insubordinate creature which

in its spoilage of nature's resources threatens

her primacy and the existence of all that

thrive, on this her least mysterious planet.

 

That Child

 

Children can be such impudent

little treasures can't they? One never

knows what outrageous observations

will spill out of their innocent little

mouths. Take my granddaughter for

example (no you cannot, she is the

only one I have), she was an incorrigibly

stubborn child, unwilling ever to take

any level of responsibility (a trait

inherited, unfortunately, from her

mother). It is these children of one's 

own once removed that have the

capacity to give pride to a grandmother's

heart or alternately, break it. Often when

she was young I would mimic that oft-

refrained "Not my fault!" to her tiny

resentful face, puckered in defiance

until a self-recognizing laugh erupted.

This is the child who even then 

exercised a sense of moral understanding

however, one that propelled her in later

years, still young, to cultivate the

ambition to become a lawyer. Few

affectations in that child, but a full

range of affectionate teasing. Her most

endearing trait, you ask? A puckish

sense of humour. On the back of one

envelope containing a carefully cursive

written letter in grade five, she wrote a

number of notes: Stay in school be cool 

(not)!; This letter is not a toy don't put

on head; Always eat your vegetables;

Some putting together required; Some

small parts age 3 and up; and finally

still on the back of the envelope: Children

under the age of 3 should not open.

Those were the days. You ask me, as a

friend, what happened to that child? 

Ah well, she became a detached adult

and I do sorely miss that child.

 

 

The Butterfly

Delicate as a soft spring breeze

Colourful as an evening sunset

She lifts her wings in a maiden flight

Leaving her milkweed birth-home

Pirouetting through the cloud-shaded

Landscape of the rain-sodden forest

Briefly flirting with nearby vegetation

Until fatigue and need guides her to a

Burdock leaf beside the rushing stream

On the forest floor where bracken

Lies in full flush of late summer

And in the silence of the late afternoon

She repeatedly folds and unfolds her

Wings, a newborn drying her dress

Ready to take her place in the unknown.

Terra Firma, Thanks

Not to question the academic and professional

qualifications of this brilliant theorist, not at all.

That a researcher in space habitation would

take his knowledge and  transform it to a

potential solution for the world's population

crowding the planet seems a tad impulsive.

There's yet room on this planet, apart from

the fact that Earth has a long way to go before

its sun withdraws from its essential-to-existence 

nurturance; say five billion years? We can wait. 

So the idea to make use of a near asteroid as a 

functioning space station specific to providing 

a habitat for a mere 700,000 people whose lives 

would emulate those of us remaining on Earth 

seems of questionable value. The asteroid itself 

revolves around the sun, as limited a life as our Earth. 

The chosen near-Earth asteroid engineered to 

provide the essence of gravity, the plan to build arable

fields and homes as a long-term project for near-term 

occupation brings to mind penal colonies of yore.

Might an intended population reflect the adventurous 

or hordes of suicidal-minded volunteers escaping the 

social bankruptcy of alienation and societal dysfunction?

 

 

In The Aftermath

 

When the wild orchestration of a 

bellowing wind and the thunder it

accompanied tired of their primal

display this summer day withdrawing

from the sky crowded with dark streaked

clouds that exhausted their burden into

the forest below birds shook their feathers

while insects resumed foraging among

the wildflowers of the pollinating

meadow alongside the stream noisily

bisecting the ravine where a great

blue heron perched just above the roiling

water suffused with fallen detritus from

above its eyes keen to identify spawn

within the spume of the rain-swollen

raceway, acute to the measure of caution

defined by the unruly flood yet skilled

in an instant strike while simultaneously

lifting its ungainly body on widespread

wings to soar into the rain-ravaged canopy.

Israeli Exceptionality

The inexplicable vicissitudes of human nature

and the primacy of tribal enmities supported

by sectarian beliefs never fail to puzzle. That

the tiny slice of the vast Middle East where

the world gave its assent to Jews to reestablish

its homeland as a place of sanctuary for its

ancient tribe of Judaeans beyond the caretaking

presence of those who never left when forced exile

scattered Jews into a global diaspora so mightily

disturbs its neighbours as an unpardonable

affront to Islam which claims ancient Judaea

as its own, refusing to recognize an old injustice

rectified when the world proved it had little

interest in absorbing Jews as equals within

their territories and Jews proved magnanimous

in assenting to the acceptance of non-Jews

within theirs in a demonstration of humanity

still fails to shatter the impenetrable walls of

hostility. In the territory where wealth is theirs

through the fortuity of natural resources the

world values for prosperity Arab nations thrive

while in contrast the tiny Jewish ancestral enclave 

derives its stable prosperity and future aspirations

through the wealth of its peoples' innovation.

Mood Drama

.

This is not the usual dusk of early evening but a

twilight cast over the forest by dark overhead

skies although the clouds have been exhausted

and rain no longer falls. Yet despite the gloom 

of the atmosphere a typical light is cast throughout

the forest from a sky bending its protective roof

of daytime illumination so like that of a clear sky

enriching the landscape and nurturing the forest's

wildflowers, seen as the orange jewelweed orchids

lean over the creek in the forested ravine, a

richness of texture and colour relieving the early

gloaming. The rain-swollen creek rushes headlong

downstream, mesmerizing in its foaming billows

music to our ears, capturing our eyes and then an

apparition of wide blue feathers rises and coasts on

the wind as a Great Blue Heron crests the forest

canopy to settle on the crown of an unseen giant.