Evolution

If you kill a spider it will rain for seven years or at least that’s the way I think it works. This rain could come in very handy in many parts of the world and perhaps Oxfam should look into it. Of course, you would need another bug to stop the deluge from taking over. And then the insect-rights people might get concerned, sacrificing all those bugs when really they were here first. Who are we to impose our species onto the rest of the world, and why do we really think we are the sign of intelligent life? Seems almost the opposite if you look at it closely. How can a species get rid of its own piece of sky when clearly it needs it to breath? Sounds to me like we are definitely making room for someone smarter.

Maybe it really is the cockroaches. After all, they have figured out how to live in all those Manhattan high rises rent free, snacking on brioche crumbs and organic veggie shreds. You can’t get much smarter than that. Darwin probably overlooked this when he was figuring out survival of the fittest. Might have spent too much time with the birds on tropical islands.

A few days ago I watched a heavy set woman walking down the sidewalk with her young daughter. The bright-eyed girl looked to be about eight years old. Just before we passed each other, the young girl skipped excitedly towards a pigeon, exclaiming about the bird. Her mother caught her in her tracks, “That’s not a bird, honey, that’s a pigeon.” And so in goes. In the survival of the fittest, the pigeon is no longer considered a member of the bird family. Probably not elegant enough, or clean enough. Certainly not like a red cardinal or a swift hummingbird. The little girl is learning that some things are just not quite as good as others. Many people might agree with this when they are not speaking in public. Some of us are pigeons and some of us are hummingbirds. The trick is to find a niche that allows you to survive.

But quite honestly, I suspect the hummingbird would actually go down first, the way it needs to flap its wings like it is completely mad, and find those nice little red plastic feeders with the sugar water in them. Pigeons could hang on a lot longer than that. They’d be tussling with the cockroaches long after the last flowers were gone, after the feeders had all been left empty. Their proud chests would stay plump for years after the last trash bag had been put out on the curb. And there would probably be enough air left behind to keep them going for awhile even with that big hole we made in the atmosphere. They don’t need sun block and they don’t mind their own crowd. They would finally be left alone to sit together in the park or perch above all the fancy gargoyles and cornices we tried so hard to protect. And the cockroaches, they can get by with the crumbs, ruling the underworld away from the birds. Or make that the pigeons.

Where is Darwin when we really need him, when we need to figure out how to get more fit? When we need to know how to save ourselves from ourselves? I suppose spending all that time defending himself in court did not make him prone to sympathy for his fellow kind, trying to convince us that we were just animals. How could we, the ones with intelligence, be just another evolved mammal creature? After all, we invented The Gap! Certainly some greater power deliberately chose to place us here, the icing on the cake. The big Day Seven bonus. We get to rule because HE said so. If you popped into this world as a spider, well, we just might squish you. And if it rains, well, we’ve got umbrellas, that’s how smart we are. Too bad about the Garden of Eden, though. I think it only rains there when you want it to. Now look what we’ve got, hurricanes and droughts everywhere you turn, although I have to say, they seem to be more regular events in the places where God is particularly big news, where He has been carefully interpreted and decided upon. In places where Darwin was shown to the door.

Maybe the Garden of Eden is just a made up story, put there to show us what a good life could be like. If we weren’t all so smart, changing the world to try to make it more comfortable. Maybe it was just fine the way it was, with the spiders and cockroaches, the birds and the pigeons. Maybe extra intelligence is not so much the gift as the challenge. Can we figure out how to stop flapping our wings like we are completely mad? Goodness knows, those little plastic feeders will not be there forever. We’ll be looking for the scraps soon enough, trying to find cover. Hoping not to get squished.

Written August 6, 2005

WIUG

Silent

I have slept soundly

from evening until now,

but still I do not awake.

I move into the day,

eyes heavy, voice silent.

The bed did not provide

what was needed.

The lace overlay a

comfort that cannot be complete.

The morning sky through the mountains,

the jungle path to the river,

left for another day.

Written August 7, 2005

WIUG

In The Yard

The red umbrella shielding her,

she strums her guitar.

Her companion.

The pages slipping away.

But she catches it,

she captures it with a pen,

brings it to the strings.

She will sing it

when she’s ready.

Not before.

And certainly not after.

Written August 6, 2005

WIUG

A Saturday Alone

A lone bird swoops down to the water before lifting up to join another. They move together into the leaves, escaping the bright afternoon heat. A small bee settles onto the with clover blossom in the freshly mowed grass. The flit of tiny insects dashes everywhere, making quick sparkles across the river.

Two dragonflies climb the embankment, one over the other, always together. It is not hot here under the tree where I sit, on the cold marble bench left in somebody’s honor. The breeze carries the scent of the dirt and the green and the heat, but I do not feel it, only sense the heavy air that is just beyond. Beyond the small winding tree with ancient bark marching upward in thin narrow columns, gracing the curves of the branching trunk. On the ground just below, a bush hides its brown leaves, passing them off as berries if you do not look too closely.

The river gives up its current, shining circles changing location when you look away. The clouds pretend to be still as they show off their form against the stark blue sky.

Nobody calls nature a workaholic, but nobody tries to keep up with it either. We are lucky enough when we look up to see it at all, when we know there is dirt in our bones. When we decide to move together, one over the other, finding solace in the shade.

Written August 6, 2005

WIUG

Hankies

I am ironing hankies on a hot summer day. The only light on in the house is above the dining room table where my table linens and slacks have already been gently placed after their pressing. I am careful with the hankies, their thin cotton dotted with flowers. The iron is turned from highest heat to lowest delicate, to avoid burning or browning.

My favorite one has dark red roses embroidered large in one corner, then perfect, tiny loops of color to make a lacey border. I smooth out the circles all the way around. This is the one I used when I waved at the crowd during the gay pride march. I’m not sure what Nana would think of that, her hankie such a delicious prop for my outfit, the perfect accent. Of course she loved my brother Arthur and would be pleased to see me still honoring him more than ten years after we lost him, as I fight to stand up for those still living. But the parade itself might test her relationship with the Pope. She was a true believer, hoping to protect us with her rosary and prayers. What would she think of gay marriage, certainly a long stretch for her French Canadian mind? The sister of strict nuns in Quebec, she would likely disapprove. But still love her grandchildren. And their children, whatever the arrangement. The heart was her foundation, guiding the pragmatic mind. She would recognize that each generation takes another mantel, changes definitions of God to include the most righteous definitions of love.

My mother would have wanted to be on the sidelines of the parade, cheering with pride of her own, tickled pink at my stylish church lady outfit with the hankie. Bragging to anyone who would listen. Mostly proud of the writing on my sign. She would agree with the politics, and the religion, of the first side, “Real church ladies don’t discriminate”, even if she didn’t understand the WWUD without an explanation. The second side, however, would make her a little teary. “All families are precious families, my momma knew that.” A big red heart makes the point. But it is the past tense. She is not on the sidelines, or anywhere near the parade. If she watches us from heaven, a little of her Canook French is heard in her happy exclamations. She is so glad she saved all those hankies, adding Nana’s to her own. She just knew someone would need them someday and she would have a ready stash. Like all items she saved, filling her house to bursting, hoping to make the match and save someone’s day. You just never know. And now I prove her point, despite my lifelong efforts not too.

The hankies will become the symbol for the official church ladies as one marcher grows to be a contingent, representing our liberal church and what we really think it means to be Christian. The hankies reject disgrace. They are proper, friendly, and correct. They will not be denied. And the strong women who came before me are my cohorts, lending their style to the next fight. Unwittingly, but not begrudgingly. They see the light in my eyes and know I take their strength, that I do what makes sense for me and lead with my own heart, as they did. The hankies fold softly into place on the table. A century of small cotton squares. Not to be denied.

Written June 26, 2005

Ave Maria

Half an hour after you died, someone was singing the Ave Maria at Ronald Reagan’s funeral on the nursing home TV. You would have loved the irony of that one, showing your wry smile as you joked that the bigger funeral certainly did not mean the more charming or intelligent of the two people. But already we can’t share the nudge. Already you have taken the whit and wisdom with you. Just when we thought we had you happily settled. It is still a shock half a year later that nobody else sees the world the way you do. Or would, if you were here. Can it be that for all forty-five years of my life my jokes were only good for you, my unpredictable mother? Can it be that my humor is yours? My husband says it’s true. Quite frankly, I didn’t see it coming, so how could I know I’d miss it? But of course I do. And you. You chose to go below, quiet at last. Now you dance in slow circles with the others who have left us, sweeping arms softly across your new sky. You are so happy that you don’t have to worry about your hair color anymore and it stays that perfect shade of red, L’Oreal #7AL. I am the one who has been cheated, not you. And I still have to pay eighty bucks for my hair color. That would make you laugh too, right after you stopped wincing over the price and wondering why the boxed version wouldn’t do. Allowing only a brief shake of your head because you know exactly where I am stubborn. But still the twinkle in your eye, either way. Once again I lose the focus of the stoplights as I cry unexpectedly in the car, listening to my favorite CD. Someday I will learn the right words. Can you believe that I thought that song was about? No. You’ve known the right words all along, simply moving through the mysteries.

Written November 17, 2004