Parallel Universe
Sept 13 2021
Scientists wonder about the multiple universe,
layer on layer of parallel worlds
non-stop
all the way down.
Or do we already live in one
down here on earth?
My sleepy suburb, for one,
on the streets
up in the trees
in parks and alleyways.
I'm thinking of squirrels,
who inhabit a world
so alien to ours;
a slice of the wild
slipped in
to our dull domestic domain,
as if an extra dimension
existed alongside ours.
Because while I'm out walking the dog
— lost in my head,
and wondering about dinner
trimming the lawn
or a minor problem at work —
these small frantic animals
are contending with life and death.
The dog wags and sniffs
tugging at her leash.
I drift along
mostly unaware.
While the squirrel's superhuman senses
are hair-trigger set
to every sight and sound and smell,
tuned
to an entire world
of which I'm completely oblivious.
Whose life will be spent
on starvation's edge,
targeted on every side
by hawks overhead
out-of-nowhere cars
the death threat of winter.
By the territorial imperative
of every other squirrel
who is bigger and better
and just as intense.
He freezes on the fence,
tail twitching
eyes unflinching
ears pitched to piercing highs.
And manically chatters,
as if fiercely disapproving
of my presence there.
Then, on furious legs
races off in every direction,
before stopping dead
sniffing the air
and darting off again
to only he knows where.
While I finish circling the block,
sleepwalking, as usual
through my small impoverished world.
I am a one-dimensional being
ghosting through a universe
that's barely apparent,
never coming close to knowing
what there is to know.
Hardly an original thought. All the credit goes to James Parker, whose short essay (see below) appears in the October 2021 edition of the Atlantic. Perhaps my version should be taken not as plagiarism, but rather as an homage to his delightful piece.
Why are you squawking at me, little messenger?
Why are you up in that tree, clenched, flicking your tail in a fury and showering me with imprecations? What have I done to upset you?
Well, I think I know. You’re vexed by my dullness. You see me lumping along the sidewalk, a blockish biped, with five sleepy senses and a private Truman Show rain cloud over my head, and my insensibility outrages you. I’m getting about 2 percent of what’s going on. So you yell at me, in croaks and leathery quacks: Wake up!
Not that I’d want what you’ve got. Being a squirrel, having squirrel-ness, is an intense condition, a demanding condition, closely resembling the last scatty spirals of a drug binge. I’ve seen you doing your pouncing runs and your sudden stops. Threats, it seems, are everywhere. You rush, you rush, and then you freeze—you wait, breathless—and the whole scene around you sort of wobbles, caught in the blast radius of your vigilance. Then you rush again. It’s exhausting.
Who lives closer to us, in the city, than you do? The pigeon is of the air, and the rat hides underground. But you are everywhere, sharing our daylight spaces, your consciousness perforating ours. And just because you’re paranoid, tiny gargoyle, doesn’t mean that they’re not after you. From time to time I find you dead, super-dead, extravagantly terminated: flattened or charred or sliced in half. My dog is a threat, a real one. He’d kill you if he could. But he never can. You evade him always, corkscrewing around a tree trunk or dancing ninjalike along a fence. His reality is sharper than mine, and yours is sharper than his.
This is why I appreciate you, squirrel—why I peer into trees and scan the rubbishy park for your pinched little unblinking face. I love the wildness with which you accompany my unwildness, the many spikes of terror and gratification that pierce your soul while I’m wondering if I left the car unlocked.
Is it my world, or is it yours? Is this a quiet, gray street, my street, or the set of a feral opera? There you go, tree-leaping again, off on some desperate journey. The branches nod gravely as you race across them.
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