the body is like a car that we drive in for awhile and
then slowly the car begins to break down more and more and
especially if we live in a snowy place the parts that used
to be shiny on the car begin to gather rust and crud from
the roads that connect our houses to other houses and to
supermarkets and towns
inside of the body is hard to define inside the muscles
of the body inside the left ventricles of the heart inside
the cartilage the intestinal wall is hard to define what
is actually happening there not the functions of the organs
themselves but inside the function and beneath the function
inside the body that is alive everything is constantly dying
all the cells from all the organs constantly shedding and
dropping off and being excreted or spit out through the mouth
or sweat out through the armpit everything going away and
going away and then being replaced and then being replaced
before our bodies break all the way down we spend our whole
lives breaking down and breaking down other bodies in order
to replenish the breaking down of our own bodies which when
broken and buried or burned become replenishment for other
bodies still caught in this endless process of breaking and
breaking down
yours is one heartbeat among trillions and trillions of
heartbeats and these trillions and trillions of heartbeats
just the heartbeats that we can hear
akialoa akialoa akialoa
akialoa you gathered nectar in a body that was tiny that
was as heavy as a teaspoon that had a long beak and eyes
that darted back and forth
akialoa while you probed for nectar we were inventing the
cellphone and the hybrid car we were inventing the blackberry
the ipod the vaccine for polio artificial human limbs contact
lenses a dependence on fossil fuels the idea of fair trade
we were inventing clothing made out of hemp and kayaks made
out of old bottles and pogo sticks and legos and asphault
and pleather we were inventing the world wide web and genetically
modified corn we were inventing smart bombs and the concept
of wilderness while you probed for insects and nectar from
flowers as big as my face in the swamp called alakai on the
island of kauai away from the eyes of the inventions of the
world
inside of your body akialoa is hard to define inside the
wings fluttering and the feathers full of open space and
the heartbeat that was beating while our heartbeats were
beating while we were inventing while you hovered taking
nectar from flowers as big as my face
akialoa slowly the habitat
of your swamp was made different by us we took parts of
it away and we introduced other parts from other places and
the swamp became
like a tightrope walker who lost her footing on an impossibly tenuous bit
of
hanging wire
akialoa everything is constantly going away and going away
and then being replaced and then being replaced
akialoa you disappeared slowly and away from the eyes of
the inventions and away from the eyes of the world your wings
beating your small body hovering over flowers as big as my
face in the swamp called alakai on the island of kauai taking
insects and nectar with your long beak
reminding us to compete yes but to compete within limits
reminding us to not extinguish each other to take only what
we need from each other reminding us to pollinate each other
to spread the seeds of each other far and wide to each other
to pass the nutrients from each to each other reminding us
to build sturdy structures in and around each other that
lift smaller species up to the light of each other |
