THE COMMON NIGHTHAWK

(Nighthawks, by Edward Hopper, 1942)

In what feels like a lifetime ago, the mid to late 1990s, I used to attend weekly poetry open mics at Mojo's, Spider House, and occasionally other coffee houses in the University of Texas vicinity. Most of the readers were young, often young enough to be my children. A lot of them were lesbian or, as they called it, queer. I was still working on my voice then, both as a writer and as a performer of my poetry. A long, hard learning curve.

Most nights I drove home via Guadalupe, even though the first stretch of it is the University Drag, choked with traffic and jaywalking students. Once I got to MLK, though, it was a one-way easy stretch the rest of the way home. I wrote a poem about that route, once. It's at the end of this post. It got published somewhere along the way.

Some nights, however, I cut east and made my way around the State Capitol. I like seeing the bats and nighthawks circling the dome, visible mostly when they cross in front of a star or the moon. Did you know that our Capitol dome here in Texas is 15 feet taller than the one in Washington, DC? Yep. We did that on purpose. Everything bigger in Texas.

The common nighthawk is a bird which makes me glad I settled in Austin. I never was around them anywhere else. They seem to be here year-round, though in other places they migrate to South America for the winter. As a nightjar, they lay their eggs directly on the bare ground, no attempt made to build a nest. Their high peent fills the dark skies above Austin, especially above moontowers and mercury vapor lights which draw insects. As they close in on a flying insect who is desperately trying to outmaneuver them, often at the last instant the nighthawk will give its screech -- not from triumph or frustration, but to disorient the bug. It tends to work, causing a tiny jag in the insect's zoom, and the nighthawk heads 'em off at the pass.

If you'd like to hear their call, go to this page at E-Nature and click on "Listen".

I had to pass the by Texas Governor's Mansion to connect with Congress Avenue, my boulevard home. At that time I drove a Honda with a moonroof, and I'd make sure the roof was open when I reached the Mansion so I could scream at George W. Bush precisely what I thought of him -- wishing I was a nighthawk and he as he was, a dung beetle. He had contaminated the one-time residence of Ann Richards with his occupancy.

It never occurred to me, in my worst nightmares, that America could be stupid enough to elect him President. Well, to be exact, to allow him to steal the Presidency. Twice.

I earnestly hope the vast majority of people who voted for him are the ones now losing their homes and jobs. However, I doubt that's the case. The elite have escape hatches (Paraguay, anybody?), which includes our Senators and Representatives. Only a few of them admit their luck.

One of them is Congressman Robert Wexler. I got an e-mail from him today stating "I am pleased to announce to you that the House Judiciary Committee has met my public call for Scott McClellan's immediate testimony with action." Not only has the Committee issued an invitation to Scotty, he has accepted. Hoo-doggie.

The Governor's Mansion here burned two nights ago. They're saying it's arson. Fortunately, I am completely alibi'd by disability and poverty. They'll rebuild from the ashes, a job we're facing as a nation. Wouldn't it be funny if it was pudgy, pushed-around Scotty McClellan who struck the match?

Peent.

(Common Nighthawk -- Chordeiles minor, by Bob Hines, 1973)

GOING TO EARTH

We are riding three abreast
late-night same-speed companions
down 20 blocks of Guadalupe,
red lights in sequence
slowing us, each in our own gear,
then waving us on through.
I am red Honda,
motorcycle to left,
to right big car with window-filled dog
barking in different echoes off
brick buildings,
wooden houses,
disappearing a beat or two by the park
then bouncing back at the library
as if he were galloping along with us,
a central city Baskerville.

The moon is full over the Congress Street bridge.

Here is where I turn away
and choose my route back up the hill
to where I bunkered in six years ago
the month I let myself believe
she was really going to leave me.

I come out for picnics, movies,
meetings that stretch into gossiping about
whoever left early,
but I always go back alone,
sleep alone, get up and scrape together
faith in the clemency of another day
alone.



© Maggie Jochild; written 20 July 1997, just past midnight

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POSSUM DREAMING

("Possum Dreaming" by Bill Harney)

This weekend the commercials for late-night TV were dominated by reminders that the "Fine Art Liquidators Sales" was happened at the Embassy Suites, all paintings done in oil by hand, nothing over $59, a huge stock that were "sofa-sized" and compatible with the colors of your decor. Some as low at $7. Hurry on over.

The same weekend that American Gladiators was brought back to help fill in the gap while real writers and real television hold out for pennies. I'll confess, I used to watch American Gladiators back in its earlier inception, when I spent years trying to recover from a devastating break-up and I was so depressed I also got hooked on Party of Five. (Bailey: I was mind-melded with Bailey the Classic Codependent.) I noticed from the commercials that one of the new gladiators is named Mayhem. I'm willing to bet that there's only two dozen or so people in the viewing audience who know that the official meaning of mayhem is "the offense of willfully maiming or crippling a person" -- as in murder and mayhem. Something to aspire to, apparently.

And Huckabeast cleans up the first Republican primary. Plus -- lots of personal thangs going on here that make my life harder than I thought I could share. Until Martha proved me wrong.

Actually, the Huckabeast victory is mixed news. Bad in that anyone who voted for him likely has mental grounds for disenfranchisement, but since he's anathema to the Rethug establishment, there's blood in the water now at their camp and, well, have you read about hyenas during a battle becoming so attack-crazed that they'll chew at their own exposed entrails? Yeah, like that.

So, I could talk about how the devaluation and commodification of "art" has diminished our cultural, making political connections keep and witty. But instead, I want to talk about possums.

First of all, I'm not going to put that "o" at the beginning. They're possums.

I know a lot of people seem to find them repulsive. I've had a few encounters with them, once startling one so badly it fell backwards into a faint, and I feel only sadness for them. It seems clear that in the evolutionary order of things, they are mostly here to (a) eat bugs or carrion and (b) be meat for somewhat bigger animals. They are endowed with slow metabolisms and little brains -- one source says possums "may have the smallest brain-to-body ratio among mammals". Its main defense is feigning death, which is not volitional on their part; it appears to be an involuntary nervous collapse triggered by terror. Playing possum described as "a near coma, which can last up to four hours. It lies on its side, mouth and eyes open, tongue hanging out, emitting both a green fluid from its anus and an odor putrid to most predators. Besides discouraging animals who eat live prey, playing possum also convinces some large animals that the opossum is no threat to their young."

But it's no defense against the threats presented by human beings.


Aside from being North America's only marsupial, possums are distinctive for having bifurcate penises and vaginas (penii and vaginii?) I could only find a decent image of the penis, you'll just have to imagine the vagina. Reminds me of that old joke about the guy who had five penises. His pants fit him like a glove.
[(a) Clasper of dogfish (Squalus). Glans penis of (b) opossum, (c) ram, (d) bull, (e) short-tailed shrew, (f) man, (g) Echidna.]

A few years ago, I read about a fascinating study done on the life span of possums, and that's what comes to my mind when I hear the name. They tend to die during the first year of life, and a 2-year-old possum has reached extreme longevity. Twenty years ago, scientist and author Steven N. Austad "trapped healthy 18-month-old opossums, then trapped them again just a few months later, and found them lame, half blind, balding, and full of parasites. Austad decided that opossums age and breed relatively quickly because they are easy targets for predators." In his 1997 book Why We Age: What Science Is Discovering about the Body's Journey Through Life, Austad wrote "“If a predator is likely to kill you in the next few weeks or months, it makes little sense to waste resources on a long-lasting, effective immune system or an array of free-radical defenses. It is better evolutionarily to reproduce copiously, and the sooner the better.”

Planned obsolescence, in other words.

To test this theory, Austad tracked down possums who lived on some of the Georgia Sea Islands, where there are few or no natural predators and, significantly, often no vehicles. Sure enough, these Paradise Island possums lived 50% longer, had second breeding seasons with smaller litters, and their overall health was much, much better. They were happy, unstressed possums.

Austad carried these findings back to his consideration of humans. "Austad ascribes our anomalous longevity to the low-risk environment we have created for ourselves. Human beings live twice as long as captive chimpanzees, he notes, despite the fact that the two species share 99 percent of their genes: 'I think the key has been our social system—our mutual means of support and our ability to manipulate the environment.'"

Ah, yes, our mutual means of support. This should be our greatest gift to earth, don't you think?

Instead, I see the quote from Gunner Dick about how the tortured, permanent prisoners at Guantánamo "have everything they could want -- they're living in the tropics". Perhaps his envy of them is why he's building his prosecution-proof bolthole in Paraguay. Sarcasm aside, last month I signed the petition started by Representative Robert Wexler, Florida Democrat, calling for impeachment hearings against Cheney. I think impeachment is something we as a nation are lusting for in our hearts, and it would do us all good to see it "on the table" and proceeding apace. As a result of my signing the petition, I received the following e-mail from Rep. Wexler:

"As we prepare to celebrate the New Year, my resolution is to hold George Bush and Dick Cheney accountable for their abuses of power.

In the last days, we have made real progress:

The mainstream media has awakened to this movement and to the extraordinary support you have given it. Your calls, letters, and emails have clearly made a difference. Already 140,000 people have joined us in demanding impeachment hearings for Vice President Dick Cheney by signing up at WexlerWantsHearings.com.

The power of these combined voices are already shaking up the established order on Capitol Hill and throughout the mainstream media:

This week, the Miami Herald printed an article on our efforts that was syndicated in papers across the country, including the Detroit Free Press, Philadelphia Inquirer, Fort Worth Telegram, Contra Costa Times, Sacramento Bee, Houston Chronicle, Chicago Tribune, NC News & Observer, and others. (Click HERE to read the article.)

In addition, CBS4 in Miami became the first station we know of to run a television segment about the call for hearings. (Video of that can be found HERE.)

Perhaps most importantly, just this morning the Philadelphia Inquirer courageously ran the full editorial I drafted along with my fellow Judiciary Committee members Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-IL) and Rep. Tammy Baldwin (R-WI). (View it HERE .) Congratulations to the Inquirer for their willingness to publish a viewpoint that is so widely held by Americans – yet one that other leading national newspapers refused to publish.

We have come so far in just a few weeks. No longer can the mainstream media ignore our efforts and dismiss this cause as only part of the fringe left.

Already we are seeing tangible results from our combined effort. As you already know, Congress is well behind the American people on this issue. This is an uphill battle, but it's one that has to be fought. It should not be the whole agenda, but it needs be *on* the agenda.

When Congress reconvenes in January, I plan to present a list to my Judiciary Committee colleagues of every single person that signed up at WexlerWantsHearings.com. I will go to more of my colleagues and ask them to join a letter in support of hearings. We will build on the momentum you have given us.

Last week, I spent an hour on Blog Talk Radio outlining thoughts and answering questions in regards to this work. So many people hit their site that their servers temporarily went down. If you'd like to hear the archived audio, please click HERE.

Let's do our best to further spread the message so that list will be up to a quarter million. Please continue to blog, email friends, and insist that your family and friends sign up!

Thanks for your commitment.

Congressman Robert Wexler

P.S. I have been running online ads to make more people aware of our impeachment campaign. If you are interested in making a contribution to this effort you can click here."

The best way out of stress is to take power, take action, and foster systems of "mutual support". We're not possums. Feigning death, idolizing mayhem or looking for sofa-sized art really isn't working for us. Claro.

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