The Lone Giraffe
Jared Adams
Issue date: 11/28/07 Section: Opinion
- Page 1 of 1
Behold the lone giraffe. How you must marvel at him. How you must adore and revel in delight as you witness him lumbering across the abundant savannah. Even the sun that slowly ascends over the Eastern horizon must do so solely to light his path more clearly.
When he has made his way to the water hole, he drinks heavily in a futile attempt to quench an eternal thirst. While he shares this drink with the other creatures of the land, there is no question that through his throat it travels the longest, the farthest, the deepest.
The water. The sole element which he shares with those who live at the element's level.
He is not physically the strongest in the abundant savannah, nor does he play the most integral part in the unending drama of the barren plain. His power is drawn wholly in its entirety from his birthright.
His neck.
It is through this inheritance that he finds his daily salvation. The abundance of the savannah is for him and him alone for it lies within the highest branches of the highest trees.
He knows that they grow for him and he takes them willingly and without question.
While he feasts with his kind in the canopies, the ground-level beasts must earn their daily salvation. A salvation that can be earned only in blood. The blood of one another.
In perfect comfort from the highest perch, the lone giraffe surveys the desolation below. The savage lion cuts down prey after prey. The hyena picks off the weakest and most unsuspecting. And the sickly wildebeest falls from pain of death, disease, starvation.
And still, from the highest perch, the lone giraffe bears witness and is content in himself.
And how must he be dealt with??How must this comfortable lone giraffe be dethroned from his perch?
Is there a way to remove one who is so firmly placed in privilege in the abundant savannah from what has been his natural born appointment throughout history?
The bird speaks most loudly, for it is the bird who has come the closest to feasting upon the abundant branches monopolized by the lone giraffe and those like him.
Perhaps it is time that his knees gave way,?muses the bird.
It would be all too easy for the ground-level beasts to find their daily salvation in the meat of his calves.?Perhaps then his neck would not stand him so tall or make his belly so full. Perhaps finally his throat might know the parched, choking draught as that of the wildebeest that now lies in decay inside the abundant savannah.
When he has made his way to the water hole, he drinks heavily in a futile attempt to quench an eternal thirst. While he shares this drink with the other creatures of the land, there is no question that through his throat it travels the longest, the farthest, the deepest.
The water. The sole element which he shares with those who live at the element's level.
He is not physically the strongest in the abundant savannah, nor does he play the most integral part in the unending drama of the barren plain. His power is drawn wholly in its entirety from his birthright.
His neck.
It is through this inheritance that he finds his daily salvation. The abundance of the savannah is for him and him alone for it lies within the highest branches of the highest trees.
He knows that they grow for him and he takes them willingly and without question.
While he feasts with his kind in the canopies, the ground-level beasts must earn their daily salvation. A salvation that can be earned only in blood. The blood of one another.
In perfect comfort from the highest perch, the lone giraffe surveys the desolation below. The savage lion cuts down prey after prey. The hyena picks off the weakest and most unsuspecting. And the sickly wildebeest falls from pain of death, disease, starvation.
And still, from the highest perch, the lone giraffe bears witness and is content in himself.
And how must he be dealt with??How must this comfortable lone giraffe be dethroned from his perch?
Is there a way to remove one who is so firmly placed in privilege in the abundant savannah from what has been his natural born appointment throughout history?
The bird speaks most loudly, for it is the bird who has come the closest to feasting upon the abundant branches monopolized by the lone giraffe and those like him.
Perhaps it is time that his knees gave way,?muses the bird.
It would be all too easy for the ground-level beasts to find their daily salvation in the meat of his calves.?Perhaps then his neck would not stand him so tall or make his belly so full. Perhaps finally his throat might know the parched, choking draught as that of the wildebeest that now lies in decay inside the abundant savannah.
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