(For Aleah and Rayne)
our walk in the forest is not like the wolf's:
we are merely interlopers, transients
we skim across its surface rather than really coming in
we see and sense so little of its complex world
that we are hardly there at all,
and its true inhabitants flee our shallow wake; they've heard
and sense
the danger that we giant, careless children pose.
in the forest, play is serious business:
it is how the young learn safely, and too quickly
the games are over,
the floppy ears become erect, to stay that way 'til death.
the purpose of civilization is to keep us from ever growing up
and so we stay
perpetual children:
helpless, ignorant, immature, obedient, dependent
first on parents, then on teachers,
then on employers and heads of state
all telling us not to worry, they will look after things, and
all telling us what to do,
so we need not think, dangerously, for ourselves.
we have not been of the forest for aeons.
to grow up would require us to take responsibility --
in the forest the children grow up quickly,
and accept that charge
but in our artificial world we shrug it off to higher authority,
to czars and priests and psychopaths
yet even these false adults
disavow the burden of duty to the world
and instead 'play soldier' and 'play emperor'
while blaming the abject failings
of the civilization they pretend to steward
on yet higher phantom adults --
the market, or progress, or the gods.
and so we never grow up, we are children all
and we destroy the world without conscience, without guilt
we are only children,
it is the adults' fault.
and cats are only cruel when young
or sheltered in the play-houses of us growth-stunted humans:
their heartless games with helpless prey are learning exercises
that have lost their vital ancient purpose, and
like humans' modern wars are merely acting out
the deadly rituals of play, now
without reason.
and dogs don't weep
because they know there is no God.
(photo: National Geographic)
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MADE IN CANADA
trust your
instincts 
