an intense sharing

 a bear cub's panic attack

late morning I head down to the creek for a plunge,

earlier we had hiked several miles up and down the valley

in air so humid my sweat drenched my clothes and my spirit,

I was ready for the early morning rain

to help the already full stream wash away my sodden lethargy,

over the background sounds of the creek,

which to me are like an undercurrent of applause,

thousands of droplets clapping against the stream itself,

intensive, abrasive cries annoy me,

at first I blame the noise on human hikers,

in love with complaining sound,

like the unmuffled vehicles they throw up the mountain,

I go upstream and realize the complaining noise

must be coming from a animal,

a distress call of some kind,

I think I'm within fifty feet of the source,

but no animal in trouble appears,

I recruit my wife as fellow detective,

when she joins the visual search,

a bear appears within the obscuring green growth,

high on the bank across the creek,

then all speeds up,

a bear cub throws itself up 65 feet into a tree, 

then down, then up, then down,

a racing intensity to its movements,

a large bear appears at the tree's base

and climbs halfway up the tree,

as if in solidarity with the even higher cub,

it turns out the cub seems to be

 having a full-blown panic attack,

I do not know what precipitated it,

both bears lightly meet at the base of the tree

and head off northeast,

it is a gift that the Venn diagram of our worlds

intersected enough

for a commonality of the moment

to let me taste the intensity of the truth

of what their moments reveal to them,

we are lucky if we see only a few highlights.

by Henry H. Walker

August 21, ‘26

chawing down

 

the draw of the chestnut

a glance out the kitchen window

and there's a dark mass in the yard,

a bear!

not very big, it was probably a cub last year:

beautiful, sleek, compact,

I grab my camera, put on the telephoto lens,

and spend 35 minutes watching it

scout out and munch down

on green chestnut burrs,

coaxing out the not yet ripe nuts,

but close enough to make the effort worth it,

the bear knows I'm nearby

it is alert to quick movement or to sudden sounds,

so I make none,

and he relaxes into peaceful coexistence,

this bear is true to the basic culture of his species in this valley,

humans can be annoying but are not dangerous

or an easy source of food,

food is often found near human houses,

but from trees who don't care who eats the nuts,

I usually stay about 25 feet from the bear,

and make little noise,

make no abrupt movement,

when it approaches 20 feet from me,

I slowly back up to give it its space,

I savor my pictures of it savoring the chestnuts,

my pictures are of it just being itself, and foraging,

later I am down by the creek,

and a black swallowtail butterfly visits a cardinal flower,

I add pictures of it feeding

after those pictures of the bear feeding in my camera,

I wait by the stream

in case the bear wants a drink, a dip, a crossing here,

that way doesn't open,

how extraordinary the last hour has been,

how wonderful the gifts

 of animal,

of plant,

of the song and joy of the stream

that is always there for us

to notice,

to appreciate,

upon which we can center ourselves,

and hold within us 

the bear, and cardinal flower, and butterfly.

by Henry H. Walker

August 20, ‘26

in pursuit of harmony

 

of slope, stream, forest, and us

every time we make our way back to the Smokies,

I intensely feel the call to savor these moments

of slope and stream and forest,

where nature, geology and biology,

are still free enough to remind us

that our dominion over the Earth 

is temporary, limited, illusion,

we need to be slapped awake

like that first shock of early morning air in the winter

or with the brusque reset of our systems

when we immerse in a mountain stream,

we need to be humbled, 

to be put in our place,

and we are, if we open enough,

this house, this home. hard against the creek,

was created by my parents

as a place to fully find ourselves as family,

as a place to build toward community and harmony,

as a place in which the best within us

can work to be true to the best outside of us,

every moment here can open us to glory,

if we're lucky,

we can find that within

that can harmonize with the music 

that is all around us.

by Henry H. Walker

August 19, ‘26