Brother man,
I’ve been watching you for a long time and often wonder if you know what you’re doing. We met in a time when you and I had the same fears and desires. You were aware of my presence in your territory, we often met in the race behind the same prey. You used to imitate me and with your pack you learned my hunting techniques. You knew you could never reach my ability to smell an animal from many miles away, or my ability to disappear at sight and move like a silent shadow.
You understood how equal we are, watching me take care of my little ones, with the help of all my large family members. We responded to the same laws of life-death-life with the wisdom and humility of all creatures on Earth.
There was a moment when I decided to approach you, to try to cooperate, to join forces in a supportive pact. But I remember you trying to make me submissive, you wanted me to belong to you. You didn’t understand that I am free, my spirit belongs to the mystery of the forest, to the wind that brings the smells from afar. You can’t cage me or destroy me even though you have now invaded my territory and expect me to leave. You have lost, in time, the true meaning of life. Like a child who, not being able to have all the toys he wants, then breaks down what he has in his hand, you’re destroying your own home.
Don’t tell yourself stories: you know that you and I are the two sides of the same medal, but you forgot the instinct that drives you. You forgot the bond of solidarity with your pack and the balance you have to maintain in the system you live in.
I’m watching you even if you don’t see me, I walk behind you silent and show my puppies who they have to fear: a fragile, creature without fur, that walks on two legs, but deadly and sneaky. Even when this hairless creature wants to reach out its hand and share its food, I warn my puppies, run away, never get used to his presence. Your salvation is in the shadows of the forest, on the highest rocks, where you no longer smell the acres in which radiates with this noisy and lethal creature.
I’m a wolf, I live with my pack, where everyone has a role and makes their contribution to everyone’s well-being. We fight for our territory, conquered according to our law of the strongest and the most skilled to lead. We walk tirelessly, me and my partner in front, as every valid warrior does, setting an example to the youngest. We pass our laws from the oldest to the youngest: who managed to live longer is the one who has the most experience and wisdom that we respect. We protect the little ones because they are the future life that is renewed forever.
You, man, have broken these laws and created new ones, made especially for you, but they don’t apply to the sun that keeps coming up and going down. These man made laws are not valid for the death that comes anyway, they don’t apply to the Earth that continues; To live and breathe even without you.
If you kill us, you kill your brothers; if you drive us away, you forgot that we’ve lived here longer than you.
If you claim to tame us, to destroy us, to disrespect us, we will come back and we will be relentless because even if you kill me and my fellow wolf, you will pay dearly. I was created to maintain the balance, the wisdom of natural life, and if I don’t, the chain breaks. If you destroy me, you will destroy yourself, because you and I are the same, children of the same Mother.
Happy World Earth Day 2020,
Brunella Pernigotti
Photo by ©Antonio Iannibelli