Recently, I’ve been listening to The Lost Birds: An Extinction Elegy, by American composer Christopher Tin. It is an arrangement based on the poems of Emily Dickinson, Sara Teasdale, Edna St. Vincent Millay and Christina Rossetti. It is sung beautifully by Voces8 with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. Tin composed this marvelous arrangement as a memorial to various bird species that have been driven to extinction by habit loss, pollution and encroachment. The pieces soar and dive in a powerful rollercoaster of emotion, especially when one has been a student of extinction for as long as I have.

But it also got me remembering an incident from my childhood. I think I was around the age of 13 when I saw this. I was coming home from school. Actually, I was just outside the school entrance. A small bird was screeching up at me. He seemed inconsolable. I couldn’t understand why, until I saw him hopping up to a mutilated figure. It was the crushed body of a bird like him. Back and forth, he bobbed and shifted. Looking at the crushed corpse, then looking back up to me. I felt its desperation. It was as if to ask why? Why?

It was at that point that I realized species, other than my own, felt. They felt pleasure and pain. But more, they felt sorrow. How else could I explain it? Self interest? Yes, but isn’t sorrow about self-interest, at its core? We feel sorrow because we loved greatly. I know, with confidence, that this small creature had as much feeling as I had on any given day when I felt grief. It felt passion. It felt love. It felt confusion. It felt injustice.  

That experience has haunted me throughout my entire life. I can still see that bird. Its eyes. Its frantic movements. I can still see the crushed cadaver of his mate. And I can still feel the sting of guilt that I didn’t do more. But what could I have done? I remember kneeling and telling him how sorry I was, but what good was that? I gently moved the body of his love off the pavement and under the shade of a shrub nearby so that he could attend to her without danger. Then I walked away, unable to reverse the enormous injury to this small, sentient being.

Birds loom large in our collective storytelling. Anzû wreaked havoc over the ancient Sumerians, Vaqub governed the Mayan underworld. A crow was often associated with death in many European folklores. And Impundula worked with Zulu witches to prey on the vulnerable. But they also come as an omen or as teachers. To the Chinese, Jingwei taught us perseverance. To the Medieval Saxon, partridges taught us kindness. And according to many Indigenous North and Central Americans, hummingbirds taught us love. But these are symbols. Birds, of any variety, exist independent of our anthropomorphism, and they have suffered enormously from our avarice, apathy and cruelty. Still, I cannot deny the influence of these stories on my own reflection.

Fast forward to a time when I worked in hospice care. As a grief counselor. Once again, I was there, kneeling at the bedside of the dying and the bereaved. Feeling useless. Feeling inadequate to the task of stopping the misery that was unfolding. But eventually learning to fill the role I was given. Being there. Offering an ear. Helping with final arrangements. Telling difficult truths about death and preparations and burial. Explaining civil documents. Bringing a cool or warm beverage. A blanket. A hug, when asked. A warm human body.

I’ve realized since, that empathy isn’t about solving anything. It is about presence. It is about being with another in a time of joy or a time of sorrow, without judgement. It isn’t about doing anymore than that. Of course, if someone is in jeopardy our task is to administer assistance as best we can. But so much of life is about coming in after a tragedy has occurred. The aftermath. Arriving at the scene. Sifting through the wreckage. Finding the wounded. Applying healing balms and bandages. Handing out blankets and water. Breaking bad news. Holding and warming. And paying honour to and burying the dead.

I am grateful to have been on both sides of this transaction. Not that I have enjoyed being in either, just that it has given me some insight. Grief is an unforgiving and intrusive visitor. A mood and vibe killer. Bursting in like an insolent, seemingly inconsolable child and smashing all the crockery while they demand even more of your attention. More of your attendance. It is no one you’d consciously invite into your home, much less your head.

But I will admit, these experiences have helped me traverse some dark inner terrain, many of them in recent days. Because some days I feel lost in the miasma of my own grief or melancholy, and this hyper-capitalist dystopia we call civilization. These lanterns help to light my way. And it has deepened my empathy for the wider world of species who suffer daily from our kind. From our endless consumption and trashing. Our mindless drive toward the destruction of the only home we’ve ever known.

Empathy is what makes us human. And it exacts a toll. But its absence is lethal to us and the planet. In a sense, we are all arriving at the scene of a tragedy. The aftermath of an unfolding disaster we often feel powerless to stop. The Sixth Mass Extinction. If we can feel the despair of one small bird, we can surely feel the sorrow of an entire species. We can be present in this moment and provide comfort while paying respect to those beings now gone forever. And right now, this is the best starting point for protecting and preserving what we can, while there is still time left to do so.

Kenn Orphan, March 2023

Photo Credit: Stutchbury Lab: Behavioural and Conservation Ecology

It was a crisp, sunny day in San Diego 20 years ago, when I stood on the curb next to friends and comrades. My placard read: “No War for Oil! No to Imperialism!”. We waited for hours before George W. Bush’s entourage arrived, there to protest his illegal war against Iraq. On the opposite side of the road, counter-protestors jeered and mocked us. One held a sign that said the exact opposite of mine. It became obvious that despite the spin of the Bush administration, his fans knew exactly what this was about. And they reveled in the idea that the American Empire could invade any nation, take anything that it wanted by force, and no one would be able to stop it.

Over the next months to years, those of us on the left endured near constant harassment for our antiwar positions. “Freedom fries,” an imbecilic jab at France for not joining Bush’s “coalition” of death. Journalists and academicians banned, silenced or fired from their jobs. Death threats and accusations of treachery. Indefinite detention. The normalization of “pre-emptive” war. Demonization, attacks and persecution of Muslims. Intrusions into citizen’s (and foreigners) private lives. This was the aftermath of the attacks on 9/11. The malignant growth of a militarized surveillance state that would have repercussions into the present day.

Bush’s unprovoked war on Iraq would proceed to claim hundreds of thousands of lives. Millions more would be forever displaced, scarred and mutilated from the carnage. Fathers and sons would be tortured at Abu Ghraib. Innocent men would be spirited away to a concentration camp in a US-occupied section of Cuba. Children born after battle would suffer from horrific birth defects and cancer thanks to the use of depleted uranium in armaments. An entire region would be destabilized for decades to come. And the US would never have to answer for any of its crimes.

Today, we are witness to the horrors of another war. Putin’s assault on Ukraine. And if one is honest, it is impossible to miss the many similarities to Bush’s war on Iraq. Similar excuses being made to justify barbarism. For Bush it was a “war on terrorism”. To fight an enemy “over there” rather than on US soil. For Putin, it is a “war against Nazis”. To protect Russia from the encroachment of the West. Just like Bush, Putin has persecuted dissidents who oppose his war. Threats, demonization and even imprisonment have awaited many who dissent. In both cases, truth was replaced by meaningless slogans, vulgarity and sentimental nationalism. And in both cases, real flesh was torn, real bones were crushed, real blood has been spilt, and real people have been killed, all thanks to propaganda and lies.

But as Putin justifiably faces charges of war crimes in the International Criminal Court, I cannot help but see the glaring hypocrisy of it all. Bush, a man who destroyed countless lives, walks free. He gets to paint portraits, go to football games with celebrities, and occasionally share wistful nuggets of wisdom to a fawning and forgetful press.

And how many other world leaders and military or state officials are living a life free of prosecution after committing similar crimes? Netanyahu. Modi. Kissinger. Salman. Bolsonaro. Assad. The list is long. Men (and some women) who committed war crimes, genocide, ethnic cleansing, toppled democratically elected governments, oversaw brutal occupations, apartheid, drone bombings of ambulances, weddings, funerals, a grandmother picking okra in her field, a teenager sitting at a café, or provided cover for these crimes. They are not only free from criminal prosecution, they enjoy the spoils of power or prestige as if nothing ever happened. In a sane world, wouldn’t they all be on trial in the Hague?

We are told by some that we are living in a multipolar world now, and that we should be happy about that because the evil American Empire is no longer the primary global power. But this simplistic worldview conveniently ignores other forms of despotism, imperialism, colonialism and oppression. It makes it seem that the US is the sole arbiter of barbarity and injustice. It makes it easy for some to erase the lives of others who languish and suffer under a different sphere of oppression. And it obliterates solidarity for the international working class, which exists independent of the government it languishes under.

Regardless of whether we are living in a unipolar or multipolar world, the effects of this arrangement of power remain virtually the same for most of us. The powerful, in whatever polarity they may reside in, use their assets, armaments, institutions and political leverage to avoid prosecution for their crimes. All the while, they get book deals, go on speaking tours, get wined and dined at lavish restaurants and resorts, and stuff their bloated coffers with coin. In the meantime, ordinary people, especially in the Global South, are exploited, slaughtered, displaced, disappeared and brutalized. And the living earth itself continues to be besieged and rendered unlivable thanks to their unbridled greed and rampant militarism. It is worth reminding that unipolarity or multipolarity are meaningless terms on a dead planet.

Twenty years ago I protested an illegal, unprovoked war of imperialism against a sovereign nation. Today, I protest the same. Unequivocally. Because the stench of hypocrisy is more than I can bear. Because solidarity with people is far more important than solidarity to any state entity. I choose a sane world, however elusive, where all power is held to account, over normalizing, justifying or providing excuses for the insanity and barbarism we see around us today. Because, no matter who it is, be it the US, NATO, Russia or any other powerful state actor on the world stage today, their destination for us is the same. And it leads to our collective demise.

Kenn Orphan, March 2023

The other day, as I left a store and walked out on to the pavement, the sky was a deep lavender colour with a streak of blazing orange underneath it all. The sun was setting, and I stopped and stared at. I reached for my phone to snap a photo, but I realized it was fading too fast to both enjoy and take a picture. So, I left it in my pocket.

We live under a tyranny of screens. They dominate our consciousness. Small ones, big ones. Portable ones, and ones that stretch out over walls. They dictate how we feel. How we express. How we connect. What we share. And it often feels strange to detach from them, even for a blip of time.

So, instead of that sunset that I didn’t capture, I am posting this photo. It is out a window on to a park next to my sister’s house. The window covered with streaks of rain. Wind howling outside. Winter is giving us one last kick in the jaw before it retreats. And I know early spring will undoubtedly hold a few icy slaps and uppercuts for any of us who may dare feel too optimistic, too soon.

Winter is generally like this photo for me. Black and white. I’ve always felt that winter was like being a foreigner in a hostile land, and I’ve made no secret of that. I am not fluent in the native tongue, so I pantomime my way through its streets and back alleys. Perhaps it is the Mediterranean half of my ancestry that drives this lust for sunlight and warmth.

I didn’t even have to do any editing on this photo. Nature, itself, drained the colour from the frame. But I’ve gained a new appreciation for the strange, mercurial power it has. One day being so rich with luster, another day being devoid of any. And how it so often mirrors my own dark times of loss and grief. Devoid of colour, streaked with tears. A heaving beast that cannot seem to be sated by anything. But a power to be respected and reckoned with, nonetheless.

Tomorrow is the Ides of March. That place on the Roman calendar where debts are to be settled. A day we are supposed to be wary of. But I welcome it. And this storm seems a fitting end to winter. A debt paid. That, at least, felt very good. Because, whether it be on the calendar or within the soul, every season has a beginning and an end.

Kenn Orphan, March 2023

With the recent spate of vicious attacks on drag performers and drag shows, I’ve been thinking a lot about a brilliant quote by the late Ram Dass: “Treat everyone you meet as if they were God in drag.” And I think it gets to the heart of this manufactured controversy.

We are all in some kind of drag. If we live in community with other human beings, then we don our masks and costumes every time we walk out our front door. Most of us wear what our society expects us to wear. The masks and costumes created for us, not by us. We do this to fit in, to conform. But drag tosses all of this pretense out the window. It recognizes that identity is a construct, not a constant. In fact, there is nothing permanent about identity.

The irrational fear of drag queens and drag shows betrays a deep-seated fear of the authentic self. The self that transcends the ego. And it is driving this crusade against those who are daring to live their authentic lives out in the open. Drag is radical because its over-the-top form challenges the status quo definition of identity.

The claim that bans on drag shows are to “protect children” is ludicrous. Most drag shows are for adults, and those that aren’t, whether they are library readings or birthday parties, do not have adult content.

But it is worth reflecting upon our own childhood. A wondrous time when the characters of a story or a song came alive. Drag reminds us of a time when we could be whatever we wanted to be, regardless of gender, ethnicity, skin colour, religion, body shape or societal standing.

This freedom to be whatever we imagined ended for many when the first adult stepped in to shame us. Thus began the long, painful death of our imagination and the long slog toward banality.

And perhaps this is why it is feared so much by some. It makes them aware, whether conscious or not, of the drag they are currently wearing. Of its blandness and of the dissatisfaction it has caused them throughout their entire lives.

In the end, it comes down to what Ram Dass said. It comes down to how we treat other human beings. And if we saw the Divine spark behind the masks and costumes we all wear, how much better this world would be.

Kenn Orphan, March 2023