Coyote in the Dark,
Coyotes Remembered
by: Mary Oliver
The darkest thing
met me in the dark.
It was only a face
and a brace of teeth
that held no words,
though I felt a salty breath
sighing in my direction.
Once, in an autumn that is long gone,
I was down on my knees
in the cranberry bog
and heard, in that lonely place,
two voices coming down the hill,
and I was thrilled
to be granted this secret,
that the coyotes, walking together
can talk together,
for I thought, what else could it be?
And even though what emerged
were two young women, two-legged for sure
and not at all aware of me,
their nimble, young women tongues
telling and answering,
and though I knew
I had believed something probably not true,
yet it was wonderful
to have believed it.
And it has stayed with me
as a present once given is forever given.
Easy and happy they sounded,
those two maidens of the wilderness
from which we have--
who knows to what furious, pitiful extent--
banished ourselves.
Mary Oliver convinces herself that coyotes talk to each other, even though she knows it probably isn't true. I think we have all done things like that. It's called magical thinking, where we believe that certain thoughts or ideas or words or rituals can influence the reality of the world. Almost as if we, through sheer faith, can will something into being. For Oliver, it's talking coyotes.
Having just experienced a President of the United States who engaged in magical thinking every day of his administration (from believing a plague would magically vanish to believing a violent insurrection was a peaceful protest), I am highly suspicious of any form of magical thought right now. Simply saying something is true doesn't make it true. Saying it twice doesn't make it true. Repeating it over and over does not make it true.
Tonight, at the library where I work, we dealt with magical thinking. A patron decided that a certain book should be removed from the shelves of the Teen Zone. Of course, the volume in question is an LGTBQIA+ title. Said patron, in the complaint, threw everything but the kitchen and bathroom sink into the argument, including, among other things, the book encouraging statutory rape, suicide, sexting, and the "normalizing" of anal sex.
I am not writing this post to convince anybody of anything. I don't care if you believe Donald Trump is the best president since Abraham Lincoln. I could give two shits if you don't believe Barack Obama is not a United States citizen. Everyone is entitled to their own ideas and beliefs, not matter how wrong-headed, false, bigoted, racist, homophobic, or xenophobic I think those ideas and beliefs are. The United States is a free country, where freedom of thought and speech are guaranteed (for now).
When a person exercises those freedoms, it's a privilege. However, with privilege comes a certain amount of responsibility. In high school, my government teacher taught me a lesson that I will never forget. Here it is in a nutshell: your right to swing your fist ends where my face begins. That means you can say and do what you want, as long as it doesn't infringe upon or harm my (or anybody else's) rights.
The United States is a country founded on the idea of freedom. Unfortunately, our history doesn't demonstrate that we've always followed that ideal. Slavery. Institutional racism. Antisemitism. Misogyny. Islamophobia. Homophobia. Transphobia. You-name-it-we-have-it-phobia. It's all there. An almost 250 year history of intolerance and brutality. (Don't get me wrong. There are a lot of things the United States has done right, too.)
How do we get to a place where any kind of intolerance is acceptable? Magical thinking. Repeating untruths until others start believing them. That was what the meeting tonight at the library was about. And a packed room of concerned citizens showed up and, in very clear terms, supported love, compassion, understanding, and tolerance.
The request to remove the book was voted down. Freedom won.
As one very young speaker at the meeting said, "If you all want to protect kids, start talking about climate change and gun violence." No magical thinking there.
Saint Marty doesn't have anything else to add.
No comments:
Post a Comment