Sunday, December 9, 2012

The Fidelity of Penguins

Biologists nod, neither moved nor surprised.  Emperor penguins are faithful, because co-nurturing.  Look to the genes -- just do the math.  The mating pair  have every bit as much invested in their chick, as do people-species Mommy & Daddy  in their baby  -- in general, more.  For, penguins only ever have one chick at a time; survival is very doubtful; and the parents themselves don’t live long.
All true -- too true.  Yet let us take  a step beyond  such arithmetic.

In by-gone times, moralists moralized:  “Get thee to the ant!” , to instill habits of industry and frugality.  And we smile at that.
Yet -- let that smile fade from your faces:  for indeed it is in such as these, that we see some single one  small virtue,  beyond-reckoning  Exalted:  for that  these creatures  have  but little else.
Thus -- the Fidelity of Penguins:  it is all in all to them.  What further more, upon their bleak blank outcrop of primeval ice, might tempt them ‘way, or offer other pleasures?  Fidelity to thy mate -- that ye may raise that chick, that single chick,
that one (that lone) most precious, most memorable,
most mysterious and ama(!)zing
Gift
from
(we know not whence, nor Whom)
  …. (?)
( !   !!      !!! )

In these, Fidelity lies --flayed -- like a Saint stripped,
by the cruel wind ...
-- nothing other between these silent sufferers,
and their God …….

Thus :  (e’en)  us.
Let us
kneel,  and acknowledge:

“Thank you Lord, thank you,
that I have someone to be Faithful to …”

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