Three anxious pairs of eyes peered
across the savannah from the wooden platform safely tucked into
invisibility at a fierce masterpiece of nature as she stealthily slowed
down to a crouched stop behind the tall grass. Beyond the grass, her own
yellow eyes focused on the buffalo grazing at a distance that was large
but oh, so temptingly attainable, that saliva formed at the edges of
her mouth. Two hundred meters away, the buffalo meditated on chewing its
greens pensively, oblivious to what the next two minutes had in store.
Her
muscles tensed up. Then, as if a silent gong of an inner auspicious
timekeeper had gone off within her, the lioness sprung into action. The
buffalo turned around to find clouds of dust rising as she went into
full sprint, headed straight towards it. The buffalo made its move. The
mouth of the lioness curled in anticipation as she went for her kill.
Within seconds, the hunt was over.
Tucked away
in the trees after having witnessed the kill, the first man uttered a
silent prayer in his mind for the victim. He thought of the many crimes
of morality that man commits, and of how salvation was nowhere to be
found for those taking pleasure in the pain of others. The second man,
fascinated by nature in action, wondered about the hunting abilities of
the early homo sapiens, and if they could ever had met the grandeur with
which this queen of the food chain did the task. The third triumphantly
flexed his fingers, which were tired from rapidly catching the entire
sequence on his camera, and thought gleefully, as he changed the lens,
that he would make a killing with these gorgeous photographs.
None
of the reactions can be judged by another or considered either natural
or unnatural. But perhaps the act of hunting by the lioness was the most
natural thing in that moment. Whilst humans go to war about whose
religion has the higher moral ground, animals thrive in nature with
their simplistic goals.
Change is inevitable,
and has to be accepted eventually. In our world of complete,
overwhelming relativity, our perpetual goal is to strive towards the
Absolute, and until our own personal Absolutes tire of being relative,
that goal will remain unattainable.
