The Mythic Red Eye Vulture

The Mythic Red Eye Vulture

We may never see

the mythic red eye vulture

scour the Santa Barbara backcountry.

Be unable to watch it

still in the air

with its ten foot wingspan

like a compass needle

trying for True North.

We may never

know of the grim reaper’s

presence amongst us.

Be forever unaware

of the scythe’s

silent swift glide

across the nape

and the mythic red eye vulture

as it used to fan

the risen presence of death.

Biologists claim

it almost went extinct

but language forgives.

It can be said

empirically that it was

driven to extinction.

Nothing remains of it.

Of it in the wild,

just our romanticism.

Romanticism to comfort

our intolerance.

We have justified ourselves on paper.

Why it had to be done away with:

the chicken farmer, the rabbit farmer,

or just its 11 million year old

innate curiosity.

We have passed the right laws,

to comfort our justifications,

pounded on the Bible as our Given recourse.

We have continued to strip away

any semblance of the mythic red eye vulture

from our psyches.

Our romanticism allows us

to re-invent the mythic red eye vulture.

As we have re-invent

The American Native,

The dolphin,

the dinosaur,

and all species we put in museums,

and have been unable to tolerate it.

Now millions are poured to

produce a designer mythic red eye vulture.

One that will not smash into utility poles,

One that will not lap up antifreeze,

and one that is afraid of electricity.

The designer creature who is

able to outrun the Rhino Bullet.

Those released have been propelled

by deep instincts to return to their

ancient roosting perches

only to find them completely

settled by an unforgiving trigger hand.

The land the Chumash

claimed home for Vultur Gryphus

has been claimed and redeveloped

by Kaufman and Broad.

Biologist have argued that

a designer Mythic Red Eye Vulture

is better than a dead one.

But these biologist have also been

saying that:

That a Housewife is better than a dead feminists,

That than Uncle Tom is better than a dead Black Panther,

That a reservation is better than a dead mother earth,

That corporate welfare is better than people welfare,

That a Hispanics is better than a dead Zapatista.

There can only be one vulture

one grim reaper

who has a love for rotting flesh,

one gawky creature,

one with crusty white legs,

one Homo erectus.

The Mythic Red Eye Vulture

remains only an obscure

reference in an unabridged dictionary:

From Quechua Cuntur to

Spanish Condor,

To English Neutralized, no perceivable danger to the American Way.