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A story
For AmyHOW THINGS CAME TO BE
Once upon a time,
the story begins,
for that is how stories begin in these parts;
once and only once they happened,
sometime but not this time,
somewhere but not here,
because everything now has already happened
and thus is a story.There was a family of beautiful aafbirds,
so named by their “aaf aaf aaf” cry,
a sharp, short, jeering, mocking cry,
that left an unpleasantness behind the ears
of any creature they sent it out after.This family of aafbirds lived in a nest,
on a far outstretched branch of an old oak tree,
far out over the banks of the Plain River.In that nest the aafbirds proudly hatched five baby chicks,
proudly carried up proper food to the chicks,
proudly kept close watch over them,
and kept them warm and comfortable
through rain and cold nights.They also kept up a running commentary
aimed at the neighboring zebras,
a jeering, mocking, “aaf aaf aaf,”
calling out after the garishly striped creatures
who came to the river to drink.They mocked the zebras who could not soar through the skies like the aafbird;
they mocked them who could not swim through the water like the fishes;
they mocked them for their stripes and boring colors.“What good are you, you who are not beautiful,
you who cannot fly nor swim?
What good are you, that you disturb our quiet and repose
and come and trample through the water’s edge,
brush against the branches of our tree,
and jostle our warm and comfortable home?”Now the zebras, like the aafbirds,
were among the first creatures ever walked upon the earth,
because they are the a’s and the z’s,
the beginning and the end,
and how can you have a middle
without a beginning and an end?But the zebras, unlike the aafbirds, were softspoken,
gentle and kindly in their words.
They felt humiliation at the cry of the aafbird,
but never did they respond sharply.
And so it came one day, like many an other day,
(and this is the “once” upon a time that the story promised),
a particular zebra, a young zebra,
with great bold stripes and head held high,
came to the river to drink.A particular zebra, and her name was Zoey,
and she waded boldly into the fast river
beside the nest of the aafbirds and she began to drink.The sharp, short, jeering, mocking cry of the aafbirds
matched the sharp, shrill, biting of the wind,
and the sharp, crackling force of the thunder,
and the looming black of the towering clouds
began to overshadow the old oak tree
as the taunts of the aafbird rang in the ears of the zebra.Then on that day came the rain in staccato bursts,
and the aafbirds in concern rushed to cover their nest.
But the zebra stood already transfixed --
“What good am I anyway?”
She pondered to herself, left alone amidst the rain and the thunder.And she thought, and she pondered,
and the rain pelted the land,
and the thunder woke the earth,
and the river began to rise.Zoey did not move.
She stood beside the old oak tree
far out into the Plain River,
and the water was rising fast.The aafbirds began to worry.
The water was rising faster
and coming close to their nest.
They would not leave their chicks.
They would not leave their nest.
The raging river leapt and lunged
and broke ever closer
to that branch of the old oak tree.Just as the aafbirds were ready to give up,
were resigned to being washed away
headfirst into a watery oblivion,
Zoey looked up.The river rushed past her
and over and under her,
and had risen above her back.
The river was fast and furious,
and tried to sweep Zoey away.Instead of escaping its greedy clutches,
she set her feet in the riverbed,
reached over and lifted the aafbird nest
as high into the air as she could lift.Still the water rose.
And she stretched her neck higher.
Still the river swirled.
It tugged and grabbed and pushed and shoved.
Zoey’s stripes were washed clear away.Not until she was worn clear out and wiped clean
did the river relent and begin to settle.
Its muddy waters receded and she was left
with blotches of yellow and brown
where once black and white stripes had lain.And her neck!
She had stretched so hard and so high to keep the poor aafbirds safe
that her neck was as tall as the old oak!
She no longer looked anything like a zebra.But Oh! how thankful the aafbirds were.
Their chicks were safe.
Their nest was safe.In gratefulness and joy,
they determined to honor Zoey,
and to never again mock and jeer
those they did not know.To remember and not forget their foolishness,
the aafbirds called Zoey “jeer-aaf,”
for they, the aafs,
had jeered and jeered,
but she had saved them anyway.The stripes that the Plain River washed from the giraffe
are often seen in the sand ridges that form
as the water laps the banks where to this day the oak tree grows.Such a torrent has not been seen since --
whenever the river leaps and lunges and roils the sand of its bed,
it remembers the stripes and the kindness of the first giraffe,
and the Stripes River soon settles down peacefully and calmly redraws them.
This is the story of the first giraffe,
and how the river Stripes came to be.Now, there are many giraffes,
and many more zebras still,
but no one has seen an aafbird in many and many years.
Of course there must still be an aafbird,
for what good is an end if you have lost the beginning?
But that is an other story,
for another time,
somewhere else.THE END.
