Editor’s Corner Guest Essay: Beyond My Wildest Dreams
By Kim Carlsberg
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Once in a while, amid the struggles and sometime discouragements of activism on behalf of peace with all our kindred, animal and human, it is good to take a long view, like the narrator of Tennyson’s “Locksley Hall” as he "dipt into the future, far as human eye could see, / Saw the Vision of the world, and all the wonder that would be." Likewise, on a mountain hike, after going up and down steep valleys or slogging through thick underbrush and densely-growing trees, one may come to a great sloping meadow where one sees the whole journey ahead and even beyond it, to distant and still more distant mountain ranges. The passage below is suggestive of that kind of vision in the midst of our pilgrimage.
This vision comes near the end of Kim Carlsberg's remarkable account of horrific experiences which she interpreted as encounters with aliens, and which clearly were initiatory ordeals leading up to this breakthrough perception of the world of our sweetest and deepest dreams, whose golden coming would make all that we too have been through worthwhile. Here it is. --Robert Ellwood
. . . [S]till I find myself seeking an Earth I've seen in a vision.
I've walked this Earth in a "dream," where humankind has relinquished fear-induced addiction to control the very elements that created it. I came to a valley where the only signs of fading domination are small gardens where vegetables are grown without poisons. There, people trust that the herbs Mother Earth sows are adequate measures for healing the few diseases which remained once they went back to living harmoniously with nature.
I breathed deeply into my lungs the sweet air of a pristine forest where the lives of trees are not cut short by greedy industry. I've dipped my toes into rivers that have been freed from the damning need to irrigate the thirst for blood found in a meat-based diet. In this perfect place, the so-called "scholarly minds" don't exploit their animal brothers to test ego-driven hypotheses in torture chambers called laboratories. Indigenous people don't stretch animal hides over their backs and furniture to prove their status by mutilating those whose only fault is their inability to verbalize their suffering.
I've walked through continents whose only divisions are marked by the splendid diversity of landscape-- mountains, rivers, plains, and plateaus; places where the only passport needed is genuine respect for all who live there. On the Earth, the people are varied and unique. To see a face of a different color is only one more reason to marvel at the rich imagination of the Creator. Furthermore, there is no iron-handed government hiding black secrets, believing its lies are clever enough that its evil will be overlooked.
This vision haunts me. I wonder about its purpose. Is it a concoction of my own imagination? An oasis for a mind struggling to survive in a world it finds thoroughly incomprehensible? Or is it some distant, parallel reality that has connected to me through roots of hope so deep they have reached some mirror universe? In a holographic paradigm an equal and opposite must exist as surely there is night and day.
I want to believe it is something more! A prophetic picture of our future! A blueprint that has been etched into my heart, perhaps by an aspect of All That Is not restricted to linear perception; by a consciousness that can travel through time. Whether this fantasy was given to me by an alien or a portion of my own soul, which may be one and the same, it has more power over me than anything else.
From Kim Carlsberg, Beyond My Wildest Dreams (Santa Fe, NM: Bear & Company 1995), pp. 257-58. Reprinted by permission of the author.
Kim Carlsberg is "a vegetarian, an animal rights activist, and an impassioned environmentalist," whose "primary life goals are spiritual and humanitarian." (p. 284) After a career in Los Angeles as a professional photographer of celebrities, she now lives in Sedona, Arizona, where she leads popular UFO-sighting tours.
Unset Gems
“Paradise is surrounded with hardships; hell is encompassed by cravings. For one who undergoes hardships in the cause of Allah/God, hardships will lead to the eternal abode of pleasure.”
See Islamic Reflections
“Let your life be a counter-friction to stop the Machine.”
--Henry David Thoreau, in “Civil Disobedience.”
NewsNotes
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Ringling Brothers to Retire Elephants
Ringling Brothers Circus has seen the handwriting on the wall: more and more people are unhappy about the exploitation of elephants (and other wild animals) in circuses. After 145 years, the Greatest Show on Earth is phasing out its biggest animal act by 2018. PETA has obtained documents showing that a number of these elephants have TB and pose a health threat to humans as well as other elephants. All these captives, but especially the sick ones, should be retired to sanctuaries immediately, not three years from now. See Elephants, Unite! and Tuberculosis
--Contributed by Solange “Angie” Cordeiro, Rozi Ulics, Judy Carman, and Benjamin Urrutia
California Sea Lions in Trouble
Baby sea lions are crawling up out of the water on California beaches, cold, emaciated, starving. The majority of sea lions have their babies on the Channel Islands off the Southern California coast. Yet, due to water warming by two to six degrees, a lot of the animals they eat are now farther north, which forces nursing mothers to swim so far to get their prey that the babies are left alone too long. “Over”-fishing by human beings, pollution of the waters causing weakening the sea lions’ immune systems, and a complex web of other interacting forces are said to be causing this tragic situation. The rehab centers, such as The Marine Mammal Center, are overwhelmed and having to turn some babies away. Let us hold these suffering cousins of ours in the healing Light of Love.
--Contributed by Judy Carman and Gracia Fay Ellwood
USA Today Exposes Chicken Abuse
America’s largest newspaper, USA Today, featured this week an editorial exposing the systematic and legally-sanctioned abuse chickens suffer in factory farms and slaughterhouses. The editorial mentions a recent Mercy For Animals’ undercover video of a poultry slaughter facility in which the egregious mistreatment of chickens is evident. See Know how that chicken got to your table? Our view
--Contributed by Lorena Mucke
The article doesn’t actively recommend vegetarianism, but enlists people still eating flesh to oppose the worst abuses. Some persons who take some action on this elementary level may be satisfied and go no further, but others may open their eyes and make bigger lifestyle changes.
Pioneer: Elma Mary Williams, 1913-1971
Elma Williams was an Englishwoman, born in Birmingham, who devoted the latter part of her life to establishing an animal sanctuary in Wales and writing about it in several best-selling books. Educated in a Roman Catholic convent and a great admirer of Francis of Assisi, Williams' mature books reveal a profoundly mystical and highly ecumenical spirituality based on a sense of the presence of God and God’s saints, moment by moment and in all of life.PantGlasStory.jpg
After early employment as a secretary, Elma transitioned to a writing career, authoring and putting on the market a series of popular novels. She acquired a farm in a quiet, lovely Welsh valley first as a good place to write. But somehow more and more animals took up residence. As she said in her last book, Heaven on My Doorstep, "At first I was too busy to notice how the animal contingent had crept in. A dog needed a home, so did two more cats. Three goats and a lamb were given to me; and ducks, geese, and so on. They had become my friends and we were used to each other."
But before long these animals -- who she says in time came to about a hundred and forty, counting the birds--moved from backdrop to center stage at the farm, called in Welsh Pant Glas. She switched to writing books about them: Valley of Animals (1963), Animals under my Feet (1965), Pig in Paradise (1969), Heaven on my Doorstep (1970). These books were very widely read, and readers came in their scores to visit their favorite four-footed or avian friends, to appreciate the beauty of the valley, and not seldom to meet Elma and discuss personal as well as animal issues with a woman they sensed was both wise and patient. As she wrote, "More human than animal problems were sorted out on the boulder step or by the log fire beneath the ancient bread oven." So it was that "The whole place was scored deeply into my spirit, and into the minds of hundreds of visitors."
It was scored also into the hearts of the animals who now made it their home. "It was theirs by right; no one could take it from them. The trust of an animal is a frightening thing. They owned Pant Glas, now known as The Valley of Animals, just as they owned me."
In her last years Elma became aware of a serious and poignant issue: old age pensioners, some for all intents and purposes alone in the world except for beloved dogs, cats, or other animals, yet unable to keep these companions in Council Housing, which was all they could afford. The lady of The Valley of Animals determined to establish a retirement community there where residents could bring and keep all their animals. This project encountered almost endless bureaucratic and financial setbacks, despite wide publicity in Britain, but was eventually established in 1970.
Unfortunately, at the same time Elma developed cancer of the spine, from which she died the following year. The property was sold after her death and the dream of an animal-friendly retirement community never fully realized. One can only hope that it has been, or will be, elsewhere. (If any readers know of such a place, please let us know. We'll pass the word on.)
Ms. Williams does not describe her diet in this book. She does mention milking her goats, so she was probably not vegan. But she dearly loved her many chickens, and it is inconceivable that she could have killed and eaten any of them. She was very conscious of all beings as cherished by God; thus it is safe to guess that she was vegetarian at least.
Here are some last words from her:
Often people, having read my books, write saying, "I am sure that, like me, you prefer animals to people." More often than not they add, "You are lucky to live as you do, escaping all the ugliness of life. If I could live with animals I might be a better, certainly a happier person.”
On both counts they are wrong. I do not prefer animals to people. Wherever we live, we cannot escape the ugliness we create. And I find that people who do not like people rarely attract the affection of animals who are often quicker than we are to note the chip on shoulder.
Elma Williams was always very much aware of heaven. I am confident she is now in heaven surrounded by her beloved animals, and helping us in our labors on their behalf here below, for she also believed deeply in the presence of saints with us, and in their ability to help with all good works. And well she might, for she is something of the saint herself.
--Robert Ellwood
Note: All quotes from Elma M. Williams, Heaven on my Doorstep. Evesham, Worcs., U.K. 1970, page 15, except last inset quote from page 125.
Recipes
Lemon Cashew Tarts
Cream
1 cup cashews, soaked
¼ cup filtered water
¼ cup raw coconut nectar
1 tsp raw coconut oil
1 tsp vanilla extract
Juice of one lemon
Pinch of Himalayan crystal salt
Crust
1 cup almonds (or other nuts)
4 dates, soaked
Pinch of Himalayan crystal salt
1 tsp vanilla extract
Topping
Dessicated coconut or berries
Place the cashews in a bowl with lemon juice, and soak overnight. Drain and rinse with filtered water. Process all cream ingredients in a food processor until smooth. Refrigerate for about an hour. Process all crust ingredients in a food processor until chunky. Pour cream atop crust in cupcake moulds and add garnish / topping. Refrigerate for another two hours until firm.
--Judy Moosmueller, from One Green Planet. See Lemon Tarts LemonTartjpg
Southwestern Chopped SaladColorfulSalad.jpg
Large head of Romaine lettuce (15 oz.)
1 can of black beans, rinsed and drained
1 large orange bell pepper
1 pint cherry tomatoes
2 cups corn (fresh or frozen, thawed)
5 green onions
Optional: chopped avocado
Dressing
1 cup loosely packed cilantro, stems removed and roughly chopped
1/2 avocado (or 1/2 cup plain vegan yogurt)
2 Tbsp. fresh lime juice (about 1/2 lime), or more to taste
1-2 garlic cloves
1/4 cup olive oil
1 1/2 tsp. white wine vinegar
1/8 tsp. salt
Instructions
Mix salad ingredients. Puree all dressing ingredients in a food processor or blender until smooth. Taste and adjust seasonings if necessary.
Review: Circles of Compassion
Will Tuttle, ed. Circles of Compassion: Essays Connecting Issues of Justice. Preface by Carol J. Adams. Danvers, MA: Vegan Publishers, 2014. 319 pp. $22.00 softcover.
This is the book we have been waiting for from Will Tuttle and associates of like mind. The thirty authors of this collection are passionate in their commitment to animals, and at the same time see justice as a multifaceted, indivisible concern. Carol J. Adams prefaces the work in her "Foreword: Connecting the Dots," and that is what the book does: shows unavoidable linkage between vegetarianism and animal defense on the one hand, and ecological well-being, equality for women, peace, racial justice, the elimination of poverty on the other. The exploitation of animals, these authors argue, is not only evil in itself, but contributes to the evils on the wrong side of these major current issues. For the industrial-scale raising of animals for meat and other products is also directly devastating to the health of Planet Earth, heightens poverty and, in the words of Will Tuttle in his introductory essay, "The Circles of Compassion Vision," "animal agriculture is also the driving force in creating the inner forms of social injustice that plague our world."CirclesCompassion.jpg
So it is that the essays include, among others equally fine, "No Innocent Bystanders," by Angel Flinn; "Why Compassion is Essential to Social Justice," by Katrina Fox; "Eating Animals and the Illusion of Personal Choice," by Robert Grillo; "Animal Rights Equal Human Rights: Domestication and Entangled Oppression," by David Nibert; and "Becoming a Vegan Feminist Agitator," by Marla Rose.
One basic point is, as David Cantor argues well in "Beyond Humanism, Toward a New Animalism," that while the "man the hunter" theory of a generation ago, which posited that distinctive human culture began in the skills and social organization necessary for predation, is now discredited, nonetheless human opposition to other animals, perhaps originally more out of fear than hunger, had a socializing role. Fighting the beast led to separation of male and female tasks and privileged those of the (physically) stronger gender, exalted violence, and seemed to sanctify the right and need of such heroes to eat more meat. (Compare the 2009 book of Donna Hart and Robert W. Sussman, Man the Hunted, with such once-famous books of the "Man the Hunter" genre as R. Ardrey's 1961 African Genesis.) Though essentially obsolete in civilization as it now is, this grisly past, in which humans were victims of large predators, has left a long shadow still darkening much of the human planet.
Inevitably, a set of essays on the same topics by thirty writers will contain repetition, and that is the case here: we face several times the doleful facts of animal exploitation, environmental devastation, and poverty. But the saving grace is that the very diverse scribes reporting on them each comes out of unique personal experience, and that background makes for many different stories.
Some understand animal abuse through the lens of human slavery or racism, some from the perspective of women vulnerable in a society still often sexist, some out of a farm background. Much is pulled together in Will Tuttle's "Conclusion: Going Forward" at the end of the book. He points to several stages one may pass through on a vegan journey: a beginning, relatively shallow level based on new shocking awareness of the meat industry's cruelty or the health benefits of the diet; an "angry" stage of negative emotions toward participants in the evil, and finally 'deep veganism" which, without losing any of that awareness, "arises in us as a heart-felt aspiration to embody lovingkindness in all of our relations with others, both human and nonhuman." It realizes "that people who are not yet vegan have been wounded by pervasive cultural programming," and in time it surpasses anger and gives rise to deep compassion that "begins to grow in our hearts for all living beings and our interconnected suffering."
As I am sure Will Tuttle and the other writers in Circles of Compassion would affirm, such a mentality would be the best takeaway of all from this book. The book is highly recommended, and one can hope and pray and many will receive that spiritual gift from it.
--Robert Ellwood
Did You Miss This One? Vegetarian America
Karen Iacobbo and Michael Iacobbo, Vegetarian America: A History. Foreword by Andrew Linzey. Westport, CT: Praeger Publishers, 2004. xvi + 267 pages. $43.95 hardcover, $25.00 paper. (Now much cheaper online.)
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This exceptionally readable volume, by a Rhode Island-based teacher and journalist husband and wife team, is very highly recommended to any serious worker in the campaign for plant-based diets in the United States. Above all that is because, in this arena of struggle even more perhaps than in many others, the past is very much with us. Voices and movements from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries live on in the conflict; so does the opposition, and arguments pro and con have been heard over and over for centuries. If one is aware of that past, one simply steps into roles that have been well rehearsed, with guidelines in place as to what is likely to work best. Even issues one might have thought were new, such as the ecological concerns and the ubiquitous "do we get enough protein?" have a long history.
The book begins with the colonial and early federal periods, in such figures as the sometime vegetarian Benjamin Franklin (who knew and believed in all the right arguments, but was not always consistent, especially in his frequent travels), the Quaker John Woolman (who had very compassionate attitudes toward all living beings, but whose actual diet seems undocumented), and John Chapman ("Johnny Appleseed"), who certainly was a consistent vegetarian and promoter of that way of life.
Nonetheless heavy meat-eating was characteristic of the young republic, perhaps enhanced by its agricultural base and the frontier with its hunting culture. But there was a reaction, just as the temperance movement was, to the hard drinking also common to the era. The major name was Sylvester Graham (1794-1851), of graham cracker fame, whom the Iacobbos call the Father of American Vegetarianism, and to whom they devote more pages than any other single figure. Though briefly a minister and self-educated physician, Graham was above all a powerful orator in the heyday of that profession (he might well have been a talk-show host today) whose major topic was diet and health, especially after the cholera epidemic of 1832.SylvesterGraham.jpg
Much advice at the time from doctors on preventing cholera included avoiding raw vegetables, salads, and fruits. In contrast, Graham advocated raw foods if possible, if not then unadulterated foods, especially whole grain, and no meat, alcohol, or (unfortunately) condiments. Needless to say, his advice was controversial; he attracted passionate adherents and vociferous critics. But his movement persevered, supported by early Transcendentalists like William Alcott, M.D. (cousin of Bronson Alcott, also a vegetarian after 1835; Bronson's close friends Emerson and Thoreau were sympathetic but did not become strictly vegetarian.) Many patients claimed healing, including recovery from alcoholism, by going on Graham's diet. As a culmination of Graham's work, the American Vegetarian Society was created in 1850, the year before his death. In 1844 the Seventh-Day Adventist Church was founded, which under its leader Ellen G. White sought to live by the meatless diet of Eden, as it still does.
Those were also the impassioned years of the verbal battle over human slavery leading up to the Civil War, as well as early years of feminism. Some of the 1850s’ fervent yearning for reform extended to diet too. The famous anti-slavery preacher, Henry Ward Beecher, also spoke against meat-eating, (as did many early followers of the Spiritualist movement, unfortunately not mentioned in this book). So did the Grahamite abolitionist Angelina Grimke, half of the famous Quaker Grimke sisters, and early feminists like the Grahamite Mary Gove (later Mary Gove Nichols), editor with her husband of health magazines, as well as the allegedly outrageous Victoria Woodhull, a Grahamite vegetarian as well as women's and workers' rights and dress reform crusader. Although not regularly vegetarian, other women's rights leaders like Amelia Bloomer and Elizabeth Cady Stanton frequently met to talk and "take the cure" at the sanatorium in the Finger Lake area of upstate New York operated by Dr. James Caleb Jackson, a follower of Graham who was veg and who of course made Graham's diet a basic part of the program. The mid-nineteenth century was also an era for the founding of numerous idealistic communes, some of which, like the Adventist "Joyful News" in California and the Quaker-based Prairie Home in Indiana, were committed to the Edenic diet and life. (See the “Pioneer” sketch of Friend Emily Gardner in PT 47 .)
The post-Civil War years were the age of John Harvey Kellogg (1852-1943), of cornflakes fame, and of the impact of the Theosophical and New Thought spiritual movements. Kellogg, a physician (considered by many the best surgeon in America) and Seventh-Day Adventist, became director of a modest Adventist Health Reform Institute in Battle Creek, Michigan. He made it the foundation of the vast breakfast cereal industry with which his name is still associated--making a product designed to replace the ham, eggs, and sausage of other breakfast tables. Kellogg seems to have been rather opinionated, and his views on some matters, like sex and race, cannot be recommended today, but his enterprises certainly did much to promote the idea of healthy alternatives to meat. It is ironic that many Kellogg’s and other breakfast cereals today have been refined and sugared out of most of their health-giving power. Lecturers and writers for the Theosophical Society (founded 1875), above all the powerful orator Annie Besant, spoke forcefully for vegetarianism, especially at the influential 1893 World's Columbian Exposition. Besant later became a vegan. See Annie B. in PT 9.) The New Thought ("positive thinking") movement also included important compassionate vegetarians, such as Charles and Myrtle Fillmore, establishers of the Unity Church.Kellogg-John-Harvey.jpg
Then came the Progressive Era, roughly the 1890s up to the commencement of World War I in 1914. It was a time of fervent advocacy and often reform for numerous causes--women's rights, workers' rights, opposition to child labor, "trust-busting," peace--and for many, vegetarianism. Indeed, the Iacobbos view this period as a Golden Age of vegetarianism; it seemed, like votes for women but tragically unlike peace, advancing steadily and bound some day to prevail. The book mentions that per capita annual consumption of flesh foods in America fell from 225 pounds in 1902 to 170 pounds in 1921, a twenty-four per cent decline. But, as one might expect, meat producers looked upon those signs with alarm and began to fight back in earnest.
Although vegetarianism as a reformist cause continued to attract support in the 1920s, some slippage set in. The War had understandably brought disillusionment with the lofty ideals of the Progressive Era; the nation was more ready to "return to normalcy" than to fight new battles against injustice. The meat industry advanced an "Eat More Meat" campaign, while the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the American Medical Association helped by issuing misguided nutritional arguments against a meatless diet. Then came the Great Depression, which reduced many to a willingness to eat whatever they could get. Other issues seemed more important, including the new agricultural price supports which often favored meat, despite being in the province of sometime Theosophist and vegetarian Henry Wallace, who was New Deal Secretary of Agriculture. When World War II came, American servicemen went to their far-flung battlefields with meat in their K-ration or C-ration kits (which, incidentally, included chocolate and cigarettes, but scant or no vegetables).
When they returned, they found a country expanding dramatically in economy and population, ready to give up wartime ration stamps (including the red stamps for meat), move into a "better" way of life than ever before, and into the new suburban tract houses complete with a backyard grill. Ham or steak dinners with all the trimmings, plus a Norman Rockwell Thanksgiving turkey, belonged on the tables in those proverbial "white picket fence" suburban homes, according the the meat industry's advertisements. On the other end, the proliferating postwar fast food chains made hamburgers and hot-dogs as cheap as anything else, and staples for the new baby-boom generation. Sometimes sitcoms on the new medium, television, made fun of vegetarianism and other "fad" diets.
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But then--against all expectation--came the later 1960s, and another swing in the pendulum; indeed according to the Jacobbos the beginning of a new vegetarian Golden Age which is still with us. The counterculture age was the age of "Peace, Love, and Vegetarianism," in their expression. A Time magazine piece on the Woodstock festival and its people, said of the latter and "hippies" generally, "With almost religious zeal, they are becoming vegetarians. They are also in the vanguard of the flourishing organic-food movement, insisting on produce grown without chemical fertilizers." While this culture was not everyone--there was also the famous "silent majority" who stood for more or less everything else--its impact on food and culture generally has continued, sometimes diluted, down through the decades since.
The final main chapter of the book is called "Vegetarianism Has Arrived;" it includes short sketches of groups like the controversial PETA, the PCRM, FARM, various farmed animal sanctuaries, and perhaps most significant, the growing recognition by the medical profession, the AMA, even the Department of Agriculture--indeed seemingly everyone except the meat industry--that a vegetarian diet is safe, nutritious, and healthier than the alternative. Restaurants now, even Burger King, may offer vegetarian and vegan options, and report that they are quite popular. The general popular culture image seems to be that vegetarians are no longer thought of as misguided cranks, but as representing a noble ideal one looks up to, even if one isn't there yet.
Whether that means vegetarianism has "arrived," though, is another question. Although percentages are very hard to assess since it depends on the kind of sample used and how questions are phrased (there are still people who think you can be a vegetarian and eat chicken and fish), I would guess that no more than seven per cent of Americans would think of themselves as vegetarian at least most of the time. Where it goes from here is very hard to predict--we'll get there, but whether in five decades or five centuries I for one do not know.
The Iacobbos in this important book have portrayed vegetarianism in American history as like a seesaw, swinging between "Golden Ages" and troughs of backlash against it. This is an important tool for historical interpretation. But my view is that, in the case of the present "Golden Age," whether it produces a strong backlash or just keeps on going will, more than before when the U.S. was somewhat isolated from the rest of the world, depend on global economic, ecological, and technological developments. The world, and so eventually the U.S., may be finally forced to recognize that a population growing by the billions can no longer be fed by animal-based food, and that the meat industry is responsible for much of climate change. And on the other hand, if laboratory meat substitutes are produced that are as tasty and price-competitive as "real" meat, flesh-food may--we hope--go the way of the dodo surprisingly soon.
We can participate in that process. Strengthen your preparation for it by reading this book.
--Robert Ellwood
Poetry: John Hall Wheelock, 1886-1978
The Fish-Hawk
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On the large highway of the ample air that flows
— Unbounded between sea and heaven, while twilight screened
The majestic distances, he moved and had repose;
On the huge wind of the Immensity he leaned
His steady body in long lapse of flight — and rose
Gradual, through broad gyres of ever-climbing rest,
Up the clear stair of the eternal sky, and stood
Throned on the summit! Slowly, with his widening breast,
Widened around him the enormous Solitude,
From the gray rim of ocean to the glowing west.
Headlands and capes forlorn of the far coast, the land
Rolling her barrens toward the south, he, from his throne
Upon the gigantic wind, beheld: he hung — he fanned
The abyss for mighty joy, to feel beneath him strown
Pale pastures of the sea, with heaven on either hand
The world with all her winds and waters, earth and air,
Fields, folds, and moving clouds. The awful and adored
Arches and endless aisles of vacancy, the fair
— Void of sheer heights and hollows hailed him as her lord
And lover in the highest, to whom all heaven lay bare!
Till from that tower of ecstasy, that baffled height,
Stooping, he sank; and slowly on the world's wide way
Walked, with great wing on wing, the merciless, proud Might,
Hunting the huddled and lone reaches for his prey
Down the dim shore — and faded in the crumbling light.
Slowly the dusk covered the land. Like a great hymn
The sound of moving winds and waters was; the sea
Whispered a benediction, and the west grew dim
Where evening lifted her clear candles quietly . . .
Heaven, crowded with stars, trembled from rim to rim.
Wheelock, a nature poet whose style and themes owe more to the Romantics than to his contemporaries, perceived the Transcendent especially in the sky, the ocean, and seabirds.
Issue copyright © 2015 by VegetarianFriends