(I) The Joy of Eating Raw Flesh

The marmot (Medieval Latin mormotana) is a shifty little rodent known to tell parables from a great mountain. The animals who come to witness this phenomenon watch an explosion of lights in the morning sky, which the marmot has designed simply for the purpose of the festival; the fireworks display is the marmot's idea as a sort of strange introduction to his parables. It's very surreal. The ermine (Mustela erminea), however, has slithered into the festival with the intention of causing turmoil, wickedness, and temptation: he licks his paw and remains quiet, hiding in the crowd in order to disguise a lustful, eristic nature. The ermine, who traveled from the northern regions, resembles a weasel, but it isn't winter and his fur is no longer the white fur his ancestors were skinned of and used for ornaments of judges and peers. The warmer climate has now changed his fur to a brown, a vague brown, the perfect color scheme to blend into a crowd of wondrous shrieks.
      The ermine's first plan is temptation. His charm is neither concealed nor pregnant. His victim, a human female, is lured, very delicately, away from the crowd and into the nearby wilderness. The young female is supposedly drunk on grain alcohol and rain water (see Kubrick's Dr. Strangelove), but hallucinatory substances have been ingested, which might very well reflect the young female's mental condition—medics later retrieved mental health documents indicating severely high Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) scores, as thus:

      0-13 = none or minimal symptoms of depression
      14-26=mild symptoms of depression
      27-40=moderate symptoms of depression
      41-60=severe symptoms of depression

      ("The patient's BDI score is 60, indicating severe symptoms of depression.") Other documents include a release of confidential information; a drawing of a clown spitting fire; and a photocopied paper with various geometrical shapes, signed by a Lydia Chione, PhD. The young female might have been diagnosed bi-polar or schizophrenic due to a prescription Zyprexa bottle in her purse.
      It's not difficult to imagine her slaughter in the wilderness. The ermine takes on a sinister, almost human voice. He stands on his hind legs and snickers, whispers something in the young female's ear. The young female—naïve, disoriented—merely offers a hand as a gesture of honest friendship and peace.
      The whole thing is completely tragic and bloody and vulgar. You don't see this type of thing on nature programs or public broadcasting television. And you certainly don't hear about it in fairy tales. It's simple, really. The attack thrust upon her is abrupt; the ermine's tail is erect as he arches his back and lunges for the throat, muting any screams while several birds fly away, making noises. Raw flesh can be devoured and spewed in the wind. It can be fragmented into bright colors which possibly enhances the ritualistic thrill this type of creature would refer to, in his circle of sadistic, hedonistic vulgarians, as art.
      Yet what remains of the young female is utterly indescribable. A medic later referred to her as "disturbing and horrific, deformed...whatever monster attacked her must've crawled out of hell."
      The luring, the temptation, the brutal murder—all this happens while nearby the marmot swoons the crowd with a parable of a bird and a fish, two very different creatures, who fall in love.

(II) Resurrection

(figure 1: Young female in new body)

      1. Birth implies an unawareness of any former life.
      2. Clothing, mascara, blush, and animal milk for the skin is already applied and therefore acknowledged, recognized, and understood.
      3. The unconscious divides reason and elucidation from imagination and memory.
      4. Personality and sense of humor remains, but habitual and/or obsessive disorders are removed.

      Animal prayer doesn't pause or move time. In "figure 1" below, the young female listens to the marmot's parable at precisely 3 hrs 47 minutes following her slaughter. Hence the afternoon sun's heat and much needed cool drink, hat, and removal of sandals. The young female has removed her sunglasses as well for better view of the marmot, which suggests interest.*

figure 1: young female resurrected

*And the ability to heal—a miracle she will later discover.

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This is from a longer piece I'm working on—a sort of series of prose poems and parables of animals and animal prayer. Possibly this is a grim children's book of foolish verses complete with maps and photos and a few footnotes. The animal physicist Polybius Woof (not to be confused with the ancient Greek historian Polybius) has some wickedly fierce words about the snout, allergy discovery, REM dreaming in animal fetuses, and the threat of evil. Reading recommendations and/or possible similarities in terms of style: the very cool Diane Williams and Ben Marcus.