The sperm whale's heart, when he dives, beats nine singular times a minute. Imagine:
beat the time where the world slows into
beat nothingness in the deep on
beatly to return into life in the up and down cy
beatcle of living that defines his
beat submariner life as he hunts a
beatlone, a way we humans cannot
beat fathom, fathoms below the surface we
beat call safe. From up here, it is the safest place
beat.
Instead, we look to the camel, the sperm whale's cousin. He is the ship of the desert, capable of miracles of water. They herd together the way we dream all animals do, in times of strife. Unlike the whale, the camel is not a singer. He gurgles, he bleats, and he spits. And yet he is the most beautiful creature in the desert because he too journeys far.
The desert belonged once to men who rode horses or camels or donkeys. Men who traveled long ways to far places. Who herded sheep, or goats, or cattle. In the middle of it all, the oasis. The oasis, the site of all that is holy to that ancient man, whose life pulsed like the whale, whose miracles depended on water. My ancestors belong to that kind. Still they feared the sea going creatures, Leviathon.
I am a mountain boy; a salt sea, sandy beach boy; a desert wanderer. I consider the sperm whale.
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