Lyon in Zion

The first bird sings before all the rest, a tiny trill that calls consciousness to return from the unfolding dreamways of the goddess of night to the day, the deus, the golden god of light. It’s a green light beneath the old tree and the blue sky beyond bodes well. The first human symbol to present itself, here at the land of the latest incarnation of the Star Earth Tribe, is that of a lioness sitting with one paw on an orb. Actually, the marsupial lion once swung right here, through the massive trees that Star Earth is tentatively replacing; it’ll only take another millennium or so at this rate before the land resembles the ‘Big Scrub’ destroyed by and for the European cow ranchers.

            After watering a tree, the next stop of the morn is the platypus pool. The path winds beneath the new canopy, past raised rock beds with herbs and vegetables entering autumn in a haze of heat. It’s been the hottest April  on record across the continent, but the pool is cool, surrounded by water-worn volcanic rocks swept to the sides by the occasional swift torrent or massive flood, here on the edge of the tropics and the cyclone zone.

            Spoiled as I am by the clear pure waters of home, where fish and turtle and platypus can be watched clearly as they cavort through the liquid crystal, this pool is nonetheless a blessing to wake up to - the perfect place to wash, to meditate, to realize how wonderful the world is.\

            But today it reeks of death, of rotting flesh and bursting, florid maggoty offal, of a large dead creature – probably a cow – left in the water to rot upstream. A rude awakening, the fruit of the carnivore tree. Returning to the campsite a tree full of ripe ice cream beans covers the stench successfully, the creamy velvet within the pods cool and refreshing with the distilled water and essences within carrying still the essence of night.

            Two dogs bark. No dogs are allowed here or on the surrounding lands, of course, but people who stay do not listen and certainly do not realise what the presence of these carnivores means here. Their barking and whining is heard by all wild animals for kilometers, and all the wild animals here are harmless – many are rare and endangered. Only the dogs are deadly, only dogs will attack humans. It’s a unique rainforest in that way – to tigers, lions, bears, as humans have been at the top of the food chain here for some time. Here, everything that lives hates and fears the wolves, and that’s what they are; dogs and wolves are the same species. They can breed together, after all.

            In this country, aside from other humans, a dog is the only thing a mother needs to keep from attacking her child. Even snakes will only attack if provoked. In a pack, dogs kill quickly and easily.

            Every animal that hears or smells the carnivore will head away from this wildlife sanctuary. It swiftly becomes a sanctuary for non-endangered domesticated wolves instead – like the suburbs.

            And all because someone is so afraid of the dark they need wolves to guard them from themselves, here in Paradise, in Eden, in Zion, in a Bliss polluted by the rotting fruits of the meat tree, the refuse of carnivores. Fear or love, pain or leisure.

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