North Rim, near Crazy Jug Point
NORTH TIMP POINT, NORTH RIM, GRAND CANYON
That’s my byline. Sitting under a juniper, my back suffering death by a thousand cuts from cheatgrass. Swallows, ravens cut darting arcs overhead. Ants lay trail up and down my arm, scurrying across this very ink as I jot this down. Horseflies strafe. Swifts titter in the incessant wind. A jumping spider on a stone. A lizard shelters under the shadow of the bend in my knee.
Millions of aspen and Gambel oak, of mountain mahogany and ponderosa, toss and roar in the wind. Each thing endowed with a life as important to itself as mine is to me. A hummingbird drops out of warp to see if I’ll yield a sip of nectar, but I wear no red. We stare at each other in a mutual stance of startled curiosity before it uploads to warp speed and dissolves over my shoulder.
None of the trillions of creatures that were, are, or will be, save for the cats and dogs and people, have names or histories. We stake our turf in eternity with headstrong headstones or with our names on hospital wings, or maybe with a page on Facebook. We claim to know heavens and hells and deem which souls will occupy them. Yet what of the bee that hovers over a crop of limestone beneath my boot? Does it, too, subsist on eternal nectar? Or shall it be consigned to a smothering nonbeing after its expiration date? Or, perhaps end up in hive heaven while I take a hard right into a paradise meant only for saints with two legs?
Those trillions die without a single mourner. Namelessness represents the only true immortality, for that which does not deserve repute transcends memory when it passes. History is a tyrant which determines, which forecloses all other possibility. A being with a name and a birth certificate has a history attached and is doomed to the relegating judgments and expectations of the world. Without certificates of birth or death, the multitudes of species called Anonymous amongus enjoy the miraculous potential of the unremembered.
© 2022 by Michael C. Just
Mike’s novel, The Dirt: The Journey of a Mystic Cowboy, is available in softcover or eBook formats through Amazon.
You can purchase the book through this website. Or go straight to amazon at https://www.amazon.com/s?k=the+dirt+journey+of+a+mystic+cowboy&crid=1S40Q4BXSUWJ6&sprefix=the+dirt%3A+journey+of+a+m%2Caps%2C180&ref=nb_sb_ss_i_1_23
Mike’s other titles, including The Crippy, The Mind Altar, and Canyon Calls, are available through this website or through Amazon at https://www.amazon.com/-/e/B002
Four of his short stories have recently been published online:
Lies, Ltd. has been published by The Mystery Tribune @ Lies, Ltd.: Literary Short Fiction by Michael C. Just (mysterytribune.com)
The Obligate Carnivore has been published by the Scarlet Leaf Review @ Category: MICHAEL JUST – SCARLET LEAF REVIEW
I See You, Too has been published by the 96th of October @ I See You, Too – 96th of October
Offload, a short story about a man who can heal any disease, is now live and can be read at The Worlds Within at Offload – The Worlds Within