How the Forest Came to be Quiet

Date: 2005.09.10 19:47:31 (PDT)
From: Richard Traynham 
Subject: crow story
To: pizo@music-art-conversation.com


  Everything is of two natures:
  The quiet and the active.

       The Story of How the
        Forest Became Quiet

  When there is no one around, the
  quiet crow, simply caws to itself.

  The male crow says, "Ee kah, ee kah,
  ee kah, kah kah kah".

  (Which I am informed to be knowing to
  mean:  I am,  I see, I hear, I know,
  I try, I am.")

  And then the female crow says, "Ee
  kah, kah, kah, kah.  Ee kah."

  (Which I have thought to mean:
  I live, I hear, I love, I know. I am.")

  For the crow is much of the wise
  spirit and much of talking and telling.
  And many are the stories it knows.
  And much these stories the male crow
  and female crow tell their baby
  crows.

  But, the fox and the deer wanted to
  tell their stories.  They said that
  the story the crows were telling was
  silly.  And that they knew much
  better stories.  About, how great
  was the river, and how cold the dirt
  of the Earth was.  And the bear had its
  story to tell, of how the fish are
  hard to catch when the water is cold.

  And then all of the animals began to
  fight, each trying to silence the
  other with their own story.

  And they began to tear at each other
  with their teeth, and claws, and
  limbs.  And they would not stop.

  Each of them said that they had the
  better story and each was determined
  that the other animals would be
  quiet and listen to it.

  At last there was a great fire, and
  it burned up the first tree and glowed
  very brightly.  But, still the animals
  did not notice.  They fought on and
  on.  At last the fire spread so much
  as to almost (almost) surround them.

  And at last they heard the sound of
  the "kuh tikuh tikuh"  as the fire
  burned the needles of the pine tree.

  And at last they stopped fighting
  and ran from the circle of fire.
  And they limped and flailed themselves
  as best they could (for they had
  injured each other severely in their
  bickering over their stories, and
  whose was best and whose should be
  heard, and that your story is stupid
  and mine is brilliant.

  And then they were at it again.

  Finally, the sky began raining small
  stones and the animals again ignored
  this. Until the very number of stones
  that was falling forced them to flee.

  But this time, they at last had learned
  their lesson.  And so they again went
  their own way, and did not speak so
  much.  And when the food of one
  animal, heard the approach of its
  foe, it remained silent and hid and
  waited and thus survived and was not
  bitten and clawed at.

  The animals thus learned to be content
  to teach their own young their own
  story.

  And the crows, were by this time quite
  tired.  For it is very tiring to become
  fire, or to pick up many stones and
  rain them down of prideful animals.

  And at the end of the day, the crows
  gathered in the trees and contented
  themselves with laughing at the foolish-ness
  of the animals.

  And then the next day, they went back
  to simply saying:

  To know, to live, to be, to have, to
  try, to kiss, to listen, to cry, ....

  kah, kah, kah, kah kah kah kah kah kah


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