By Dario Poli.
In the year 2043, flying high above a spectacular white capped mountain peak, a large genus Aquila eagle, with a majestic appearance and enormous wing span, is seen swooping down between translucent white clouds and over green abundant forests, flourishing way beneath its dramatic summit
The eagle’s sonorous message, is carried forcibly by the assisting wind echoing down to the lush valley below, summoning all the remaining creatures of the Animal Kingdom, to gather for a compulsory assembly at a large glade that overlooks the sparkling fast flowing River of Life, surrounding the base of this mountain.
The river’s fresh pure waters, are sparkling and silver blue tinted, reflecting the sun’s penetrating health giving energy, conveying to all the presence of an eternal life.
As far as the eagle’s sharp eyes can see, black and grey clouds are hovering close to the base of the luxuriant landscape surrounding the mountain, temporarily arrested from engulfing the terrain and wilfully devouring all remaining life forms on this once bountiful planet, protected only by the resistant power of the River of Life.
Mother Nature, the ordained creator of all, has urgently called for this gathering, as beyond this final bastion of environmental riches, lie dark, menacing, poisonous clouds that are ominously closing in.
Her voice thunders with a vibrant power, as if from the depth of the mountain, echoing within the senses of all living creatures.
The trees sway together in a branch clapping rhythmic response to her first words.
“To the six tribes of the animal kingdom…to you the Mammals, to you the Birds, to you the Fishes, to you the Reptiles, to you the Amphibians, to you the Invertebrates, and finally to you the insects and you our irreplaceable fauna.
Listen carefully, to my never to be repeated words. Bring two species of every creature and sex of your group and join me in the circle of light, over by the side of the River of Life, adjacent to the edge of the Forest of Tranquillity.
Do not, under fear of expulsion, bring a solitary specimen of Homo sapiens or any related form of taxon Hominidae.
I await your presence here, before our beloved and glorious life-giving sun fully rises.”
Her message in an instant, is carried by emotional intelligence to all animal species and life forms still alive in our world. The sounds of their march to the agreed meeting place, immediately begins.
Two by two, looking nervously at each other, they assemble at the proposed spot, chattering excitedly amongst themselves.
Two majestic lions, kangaroos, a couple of deer, giraffes, coyotes, a desert iguana, a coral snake, a pair of bats, two river otters, tarantulas and ants and some termites, were the first of the arrivals.
A pair of large dolphins, sharks, salmon and other fish, were poised at the edge of the river eager to be represented. Every living creature, insect, fauna and living microbes had their representatives there, with one exception. Not a single human being in sight.
The voice of Mother Nature boomed out.
“My friends gathered here, 6 million years ago, I created your very lives and 6 billion years before that, I established a multitude of microbes and viruses that set the ground for your arrival, providing for you my precious creations, with luxuriant energy rich landscapes, filled to abundance with every variety of life to sustain you.
But since those heady days of our beautiful earth, many things have changed, beginning with my gravest error, when I foolishly agreed to allow beings from another solar system, toestablish a base here known as the Garden of Eden.
They persuaded me via their almighty God that they would be here for a very limited time, begging for my support and co-operation to advance inter-galactic unity. Little did I know they had deceived me with illusions and false promises.
I discovered too late, that it was an invasion using their creations the humans, to take control of our world under a pretext of a spiritual enhancement that I believed was to benefit and enrich our planet. I was duped.
Generously I opened the doors without restraint and they flooded in. The rest you know, as you have all suffered severely and can see the results.
Today humbled, I come before you, to offer you one solution to save our planet that your precious lives depend upon. The decision has to be made now, as we are all surviving in the last 200 miles of inhabitable terrain and pure pollution free air in our dying world.
Yonder, are the masses of dark grey clouds of life destroying poisons, created by the unimaginably evil humans that creep steadily towards us.
I call for your help to restore this wondrous planet to its former health and glory. We need one hundred thousand years to perform this task. I need your support and effort to help me achieve this miracle rebirth. I want you to discuss and then vote, a yeah or nay, before our sun sets today.
Hark…listen yonder to the despair and screams of horror from their voices beyond our precious River of Life.
Can you hear them cry? Can you hear the evil beasts, gnashing and grinding their putrid teeth in murderous anger, as they weep and wail? Can you hear their desperate begging to save their impure lives from themselves?
We who freely gave them abundance…They in return and without mercy or pity, conquered, tortured, exploited, enslaved, experimented upon us and murdered us in the hundreds of billions.
Not only living creatures, but our precious earth and irreplaceable plant life, losing most of the 391,000 species I created. Destroying precious life in our vast oceans and chocking off all the life forms in our rivers that are now poisoning us all. Even the very air we breathe is filled with toxic pollutants from their many experiments.
They created their own false stories of creation by the invention of their multiple Gods, ignoring the truth, ignoring me. They lied, cheated, imprisoned, tortured and murdered each other with impunity, mass exterminating and liquidating entire populations with their disgusting technical devices, destroying themselves, in this, beyond sick process.
They went against all universal and natural laws, creating scores of sick, despotic methods of governing themselves, often evilly camouflaged by cynically manipulative systems, pitilessly offered and enforced onto to their own gullible brethren, masquerading as beneficial to them, instead of the cruellest of tyrannies that ensued. The list of titles is too long to proclaim here today.
Now my dear friends, with their twisted souls and burnt disfigured bodies smelling in ugly putrefaction, they come to the edge of the River of Life, to beg refuge. Weep and wail, weep and wail.
Listen to them scream out to us, begging forgiveness for their past crimes against their own humanity and Mother Nature.
Kings, emperors, political leaders, bankers, and heads of business corporations, Popes, Mullahs, Rabbis, Buddhists and priests of 10 thousand distinct religions over their world.
Leaders and heads of their vile media corporations. Even the world’s most vicious militaries are offering to surrender and lay down all their arms and serve us all, if we can forgive them.
As you see, we have just been offered miles of truckloads of gold, silver, millions of diamonds, tens of thousands of works of art and human slaves, anything we might want, just to forgive them and allow them to cross over to us, via the golden bridge of spiritual steps to our River of Life. We have no more time. The final decision is ours.”
Enormous rumblings and cheering erupts from all the species listening to her words.
“No, no, never. No, no to ego-consumed, mass murderous humans. Never, ever must they cross to us. They are all incurable liars. They will cheat and kill us again. No never. They shall never pass.”
Without warning, one voice barks out defiantly against the over whelming anti-human sentiment. It is a solitary, black powerfully built dog, a German shepherd called Ribot. He snarls forcefully.
“But there were some good ones also. Can we not save some?
A stunned silence descends over the large gathering, then the murmurings of dissension begin again.
“No to humans…never again, they shall not pass. No pasaran.”Moo the Spanish bulls…
”Never”trumpet the African elephants.
“Never, ever” Hiss the pythons and snakes curled around the trees.
“We were the first victims in the Garden of Eden. How they lied and falsely debased us all.”
Ribot answers defiantly.
“You are not right. There are good humans who have respected and loved us”
“Yes perhaps a tiny few”Echoes a seagull circling above them …
”You are biased. You are known to be man’s best friend, but the rest of us don’t have that privilege and we are turned into food, clothes, bags, and wall trophies”.Growl the foxes and roaring bears.
“We are hunted and killed in our own forests. “Loudly howl the wolves.
Don’t forget us, we were crushed to death in the millions by huge machines in farm buildings”Squeak the chickens and hens.
“Experimented on to make their body lotions and perfumes and worse, brutally incarcerated in cages and eaten.”Calls out a racoon.
“I agree.”Bays the mule…“We were slave labour for them as they whipped and beat us till we dropped. No mercy shown.”
A huge irritable male lion, gnashes his formidable fangs and growls like thunder.
“Yeah, all through human history, we have been exploited and destroyed. The Egyptians hunted and killed us from their fast chariots and the Romans used us in the circuses, to die fighting the gladiators”.
“They can never change, they are programmed to kill and destroy anything they touch.”Bellows a mighty humpback whale from the River of Life close by
“They can never be trusted.”Scream the seagulls in unison, flying high above the meeting.
“We see how they destroy, pollute and steal, killing our precious sea life.”
“They leave trails of a foul stench wherever they go” Sigh the slow moving snails.
“Humans are all sick, we can do nothing with them. Not one must pass to our side.”Erupts the crowd.
“If you love them so much Mr Dog? Go back across the bridge and see what happens to you.” Scream all the assembled creatures.
Hearing the revulsion against his request, the German shepherd lowers his head and with his tail between his legs, moves away in shame from the centre of the debate, trying to avoid contact with other animals,
“So we agree then?Calls out mother Nature.”
“Yes, yes, yes.”Is the unanimous cry from the voices of all assembled species below that echoes throughout the land.
“The vote from this moment is officially approved and confirmed”.
Suddenly from high above them, a long loud scream is heard. All heads turn upwards to the skies and wheeling dramatically above them, they see the large eagle, wildly, dramatically flapping her wings and calling to those below….
Surprised and confused, the crowd watch the majestic bird fly directly down to the edge of the River of Life, then land upon what seems to be some rocks protruding from the river’s edge, her long neck pointing towards something between the rocks.
“It’s alive,she screams. “I need help”.
In a flash, Ribot the German shepherd, impulsively breaks through the tightly packed crowd of animals and dashes at full speed to the river’s edge.
When reaching the water’s edge, he sees the huge eagle, trying to drag a floating basket like object to the river bank by its large talons, being supported by his flapping wings.
Ribot hears a crying sound and realises there is a baby, a human child in the basket.
Without hesitation he dives into the flowing water, swims to the basket and with his powerful fangs gripping the woven material like a handle, helps the eagle drag the basket, to the safety of a tiny narrow strip of stony beach between the rocks.
Vigorously shaking the water from his fur, he peers into the basket and sees a smiling, gurgling little human baby gazing directly into his eyes.
He barks ferociously to all the other animals to come and help him, as the eagle like a grand protector hovers over the child in the basket, calling out for assistance to the massed crowd nearby.
“It’s a baby, a little girl. A baby girl. What shall we do? “Help us please.”
No help comes from all the assembled creatures, who motionlessly observe this new revelation in a dour united silence.
“Help save her,”Screeches the eagle, flying low over the now muttering masses of life beneath its wings, now beginning to openly display resentment, at this unwelcome discovery, muttering and screeching obscenities amongst themselves.
Telepathically they communicate this stunning news directly to Mother Nature, asking for her wise guidance.
She replies with considerable sadness. ”To all life forms, our joint decision regarding the future of the humans has been taken and I order the immediate destruction of the last lifeline, the connecting bridge, to stop certain death coming to us.
I have made so many mistakes before in my judgements over humans, so in the case of this helpless baby girl, I now wash my hands of this discussion and leave you all to decide her fate.
The future of her humanity is in your hands.”
“Her fate is sealed.”Howl all the assembled species in reply.
“Hurl her back to the evil ones on the other side. There will be no compromise ever”.
As they advance on mass towards the basket containing the baby, they hear loud wailing sounds of the baby girl crying pitiably.
“Ma, ma, mama, mam, ma, ra, ma, ra, ma… ra.”
Ribot defiantly stands alone in front of the helpless baby, rising to his full height, his hair bristling, snarling viciously, his teeth bared, ready to fight to the death. The crowd surges forward, brave Ribot is overwhelmed and like a rag doll, tossed aside and lost in the swell of bodies.
Suddenly from above them, the eagle swoops down, its huge flapping wing span and sound , temporally hypnotises them and in seconds, two huge talons grip the basket and from the rocks, lifts it like a feather and flies high directly towards the mountain top, endlessly screaming the same words that echo over the land.
“She is mine, she is ma, she is manna, she is mama, she is ma and she is my Maamaa..aa…ra!”
Flying higher and higher, up through the dense cloud to a far off peak beyond all eyes, to begin a New World.