This is a response to my friend Peter Clothier's seasonal musing (http://thebuddhadiaries.blogspot.com/2007/11/cockroach.html) about whether killing a cockroach is karmically correct. His blog post brought up some interest responses, such as this one from robin andrea, who said...
"When I catch bugs in the house I alway use a cup or small bowl to put over the critter. I then slide a postcard or envelope under the cup, catching the bug inside. The bug is only slightly offended by the experience, and is usually happy to crawl or fly out of the container. I've caught all kinds of citters this way, even a mouse the cat brought in.
Thus, my response took off from hers, and took in another gentleman's musing over the transcendental reincarnative implications. ...
Peter, around our house I use the Robin Andrea method as well, preserving the critters -- crickets mostly -- to carefully be served up to the reptile gods in the persons of my son's Gekko, Zeppo, and the three frogs that live in the next habitat over.
As to the reincarnation question, though you are correct in citing Mr. Kafka, I would prefer to honor the voice of an American auteur, Mr. Don Marquis:
mehitabel was once cleopatra
By Don Marquis, in "archy and mehitabel," 1927
boss i am disappointed in
some of your readers they
are always asking how does
archy work the shift so as to get a
new line or how does archy do
this or do that they
are always interested in technical
details when the main question is
whether the stuff is
literature or not
i wish you would leave
that book of george moores on
the floor
mehitabel the cat and i want to
read it i have discovered that
mehitabel s soul formerly inhabited a
human also at least that
is what mehitabel is claiming these
days it may be she got jealous of
my prestige anyhow she and
i have been talking it over in a
friendly way who were you
mehitabel i asked her i was
cleopatra once she said well i said i
suppose you lived in a palace you bet
she said and what lovely fish dinners
we used to have and licked her chops
mehitabel would sell her soul for
a plate of fish any day i told her i thought
you were going to say you were
the favorite wife of the emperor
valerian he was some cat nip eh
mehitabel but she did not get me
archy
No comments:
Post a Comment