Nature’s Heritage
June 13, 2011
Note: in Neo-Paganism there is a debate amongst some group, between “eclectics” and “traditionals” for instance. And this was my response to that, a feeling that I wanted to transcend those and get to the basics of life. In fact, of “Truth, Love and Life”, which made a sort of trinity for me. There is also mention of ecosystems and “foreign” introductions. Something with which I was familiar in my studies on ecology and conservation.
I don’t want traditional or eclectic,
I want Truth.
I don’t want old or new,
I want Love
I don’t want foreign or native,
I want Life.
If Truth, Love and Life are not the greater
Then let me die now!
Never mind my ancestry!
What about my love for ALL humanity.
Never mind the land’s spiritual traditions!
What about our ignorance of the land’s ecology?
Never mind about foreign gods!
What about our foreign intrusions?
Those domesticated plants,
Which have no meaningful existence within local ecology.
And worst still are the foreign species
That do flourish and conquer;
The mink, japanese knotweed or grey squirrel
That do suffocate our native life,
Delivered to these fair land’s by our own sinful hands.
I look upon the countryside
And wonder upon it brutal acceptance
Of these things.
It sees the foreign not as right or wrong
As we do.
The mink on one hand thrives so well
Destroying our wonderful water vole.
Yet a wallaby seen in the New Forest lives wild
Yet dying as its body fights the cold.
You see, nature cares not for the traditional or eclectic,
For old or new,
Foreign or native.
It cares only for change,
Revelling in the dance of it
No matter what its form.
Thus it has been
Thus it is
And thus it shall be ever onwards.
Change is Nature’s God,
Not the many gods of Old
Or the one God the Christ.
Mere human futilities there are
Before the universes power.
Mere spits in a vast ocean.
Laugh, laugh, laugh!
Traditional or eclectic, old or new, foreign or native,
None of these shall succeed
Before the all-consuming change
That is the crown, throne and kingdom of Nature.
This is great, I love your account of how strong and resilient Mother Nature can be inspite of even our most disastrous insults. If one looks closely enough you can even see the tiniest of atrocities taking place in the ignorant innocence of our own backyards. But I wonder if you have found any beneficial relationships of introduced species in your study of ecology and conservation?
Thanks for your comment.
Yes there are benefical relationships to be had, eventually. Sometimes new species can be a shock, and it can cause problems, such as the mink to the water vole mentioned. The Hazel tree (corylus avellana), I think was introduced to Britain by the Romans, or before. Eventually it has become part of the ecosystem, it has naturalised.
I watched a documentary about a plant that had been introduced from S America to Africa. It was a water plant that invaded a lake and water courses, clogging it up, interfring with the fishing the locals were doing and also creating areas where disease could be harboured. It couldn’t be taken out, but instead they introduced an insect that would help moderate this plant.
There’s is controversy with this subject, because ecosystems are always changing, so “conservation” may not be the right word for working with ecosystems, I don’t know. There’s an argument that humans are doing what nature has always been doing, introducing new species, except faster.
I think there tends to be a difference between “invasive” species that can overtake an ecosystem (Japanese knotweed comes to mind), more benign species that integrate quite well, and some species that can be introduced but wouldn’t survive very well anyway (wallabies are in the New Forest but they are suffering because their tails can’t take the frost). So there are different degrees to the effect a new species can have on an ecosystem.
Well, I’ll stop there, there’s a lot I could say I suppose, lol!