there
are days when the lines, like mini neat black and white piano keys and notes
tied into perfect riffs and runs, refuse to tumble out, when the writing genie lies sleeping in the
soft sunlight outside. i sit vaguely determined at my desk, staring at ‘it’
outside, wondering if i too should lie outside, a sunny bliss post card of a
day, among the wildflowers and green grass, eating a snicker bar and watch the
swallows.
instead,
i decide to list my favourite insects, in order of preference, in the hope my
writing genie will wake up….sleepy buggar these days, it seems.
first
on the list are bees. bees definitely because:
they
make honey. the planet would die without them. i like their fuzzy little
stripes – they’re high on the cute factor. i like how they hang in clumps on
the acacias when they’re moving house, protecting their queen. many times i’ve
walked close by, with the horse, and they simply…hang, not even humming. and dead still. a
sleeping tornado. they have an excellent
work ethic, even around flowers, like ants. who hasn’t spent time on their
tummy watching ants marching in military single file, taking building materials
down under, struggling under the heavy
burden of boulder sized bread crumbs or sitting in head high grass watching a
bee harvesting pollen? if you haven’t
then you must. when they swarm, darkening an afternoon, find shelter. fast. i remember once standing on the
bald green foothills of mt meru, a swarm humming close over our heads, the
noise like the Japanese Airforce in full battle. all the maasai fell flat to
the ground…i followed suite. this is a good thing to remember. go flat and lie
still. never move. like champoto told me once in luangwa valley, if your boat
capsizes in a crocodile infested river,
never swim along the surface but rather take a deep breath and swim
quietly underwater, preferably breast stroke, until you get to shore. splashing
along on the surface won’t save you. these are all healthy survival tips. but
back to beautiful bees. you will never
know a bee coward. they die for their stings and when they kill, they all join
in.
amanzingwenya
(lake of crocodiles in zulu, maputuland, Mozambique border country) in the
forest. clive, safari c, benzef, me, and one small zulu boy guide, 12 maybe? benzef led the expedition, white like a
snowman from his factor 50. bees are deeply offended by this smell. clive, our
boss and anthropologist extraordinaire and dangerously allergic to bees, shouts “BEES!
RUN!” and away we charged, blindly, wildly into the forest. clive dove into the
Lake Of Crocodiles go get away from the attack. they followed him over the
water. everytime he came up for a breath, they attacked. When eventually, they
buzzed off furiously, clive clamboured ashore, more than 50 stings all over his
face, neck and back. his tongue began to swell, his breathing became harder and
harder. we took the bic biro out, removed the ink, took the penknife out – a tracheotomy
was next….he was dying. quite suddenly, in this god forsaken place, we heard a
boat engine, Kwazulu Bureau of Natural Resources rangers! we waved them down. They
took him back to camp, where he literally crawled to his hut, swallowed
handfuls of anti-histamines and scrawled a love letter to his wife: sorry I’ve
been such a bastard, and lay down to die. and didn’t.
respect
bees. they have been rated highly by great civilizations gone by, like the
mayans and the egyptians, those in The Know… they build hives in witches’
eaves. with these halcyon days of early winter
weaving their way quietly and magically about us, the bees hum in my roof, makin' honey and i’m in love.
termites
are a tie first with bees, in my book. (are you still there? excellent. ) since i was a wee thing, i have admired the palaces, towers and universes of these tenacious, voracious, beautiful insects…
a beauteous cast system in motion but one which can transform when
necessary….from reproductives to soldiers to workers to kings to queens….only
the queen can never change….she rules, deep in the dark.
the
moon slips out from behind a cloud. the storm’s over. fireflies, thousands of
them, twinkle, like fallen stars, in the
forest all around. i’m a little drunk
from whisky and i lose the poker game. far away, near the escarpment,
lightening flickers. the shards of mirror, which she hung in the giant sausage
tree, twirl in the night wind, a sexy wind laced with the heady fragrance of
rain and wet soil – light shards glinting in dark corners. the mournful whoop of a hyaena drifts through
the yard. and there, suddenly, they pour out, like mercury from the
mound…alates, winged termites, flying ants, more and more and more, dancing
with the spinning light, streaming into the fresh, clean night sky, fat with
stars. they have to fly before mating. everyone in a wild whirlwind mercurial search for
love, for a mate – to be a king or a queen.
after the frenzy of love making, their silver, laced wings fall off, soft like snow. boy and girl become king and queen, a done
deal… a queen for the rest of her life – in a sunless
palace, overweight, giant, unable to move, pale and white, so grossly fat she
can’t move, blindly laying thousands of eggs for up to 50 years.
i think i’d
prefer being eaten just after making love. flying ant feasts are celebratory. hyaena
lurk, snacking on bitings, snakes, honeybadgers oh everyone. people gather them in buckets and fry ‘em up. they
taste a bit like peanut butter – good with salt.
yes. i wonder if the queen remembers her one
night of flight? the flight of a lifetime…surely it’s one of the prettiest,
most magical, hypnotic things i’ve ever seen, thousands of little kings and
queens whirling silver under a watery
african moon...
toodely toot oh bestests. next week: dung beetles. david attenborough, watch your back. bisous X.X.X. buzzy ones on yer neck. x j.
