So, I've got a bit of a thing for vultures. They are quite strikingly efficient beings. And I do admire their laziness, that effortless adaptability of feasting on corpses. I'm not sure whether this connects with anything political. I have fantasized about commissioning a war memorial, to the War Profiteers, a bronze dramatic scene, of vultures and jackals and hyenas, squabbling over the corpse of a soldier. I'm not entirely sure who'd fund that sculpture. But I do know, that it would fit well, on the Mall.
My dad had a thing for vultures too. I remember him stopping during road trips, in Jamaica, to gaze awedly at a cluster, swarming over something rotten. And I remember once running up to him excitedly, proudly, to tell him about the flock of vultures that had suddenly settled, in our garden. It took me years to connect his abrupt disenchantment, with the fact that they'd buried a road-killed cat in the garden, the day before.
Vultures are filthy nasty beastses. I have enormous respect for the real ones, and none, for the human ones. Although I do understand how immensely profitable it must be. I've been living long enough in DC, to appreciate that. I've driven past enough monstrous mansions, stretch limos, and high school kids driving Hummers, to understand that. There's a lot of money flowing out of the Pentagon, the Pentagram, whatever you want to call it.
And still, I have nothing but admiration, for the real vultures. I've watched them soar and coast, adjust with the flick of a wingtip. They roost together, and those that haven't found a corpse, the day before, follow those that set off in the morning, with conviction. I've startled them from corpses, have watched them cruise up, coast the thermals, watched the sunset flick from their wings. I argue unabashedly, that they're beautiful.
DC's not the funniest of towns. I don't much expect, good punchlines. But this spring, walking back from a camping trip, on the C&O Canal, I saw a tree full of vultures. A rare sight. Accompanied by a wet stench of death. There were at least 13. And they were focussed on the floating bloated corpse of a deer, bobbing in the canal. I didn't have a camera with me, unfortunately. But there they were. I sat back, to watch the show.
The vultures were lined up, in some indeterminable hierarchy, for the corpse. One would flutter down, swoop/balance, and start to work at the flesh, burrowing under the pelt. And then another would swoop in, and the corpse would wobble, the two birds waving up, winging their balance and aggression, and then settle in, sharing the table.
It was, admittedly, awkward and distasteful, the wet rending, of dead flesh. The vultures showed a certain grim persistence, an ongoingness. Corpses don't ever get anything but easier to eat. But the impatience, of the vultures still waiting in the tree, was obvious. Every few minutes, a third would flap out, and on the corpse, which would sink and bobble, threaten to roll, and all three would go rampant, striving to stay aerial.
A jogger ran past, during one of the clashes. I'd been ignoring the passersby, the walkers, the bikers, the people pushing strollers. And so I can't quite describe this one, over the middle, agewise, maybe a shortcut greying browning blond, more heavy than stocky, but more trunklike than fat, eyes of some color or other, I only noticed him really, when he said, while passing, "All paths to glory, lead but to death."
He'd had enough time to come up with the line, slow-running along the curve of the tow-path, watching me watching the vultures. And there are enough reasons to come up with a line like that. He could have been part of the profit-structure, or a well-read and/or cynical political. He could have been an opponent, or a supporter, or a lackey or a millionaire or a profiteer, or some variation thereof.
Apparently, the actual quote is, "The paths of glory lead but to the grave.". Muy Kiplingesque. Hard to say, zactly what paths to glory that specific deer was following, before it ended up floating dead in the canal. A bit of fucking, a bit of fighting, a bit of feasting, most likely. At least some of the above. At the moment, it had a strong Afghanistan reference for me. Or hell, Ozymandias, whatever. the connection between pride/glory and war/death, seems pretty much explicit to me.
But maybe not to everyone. Where there's corpses, there's feasts, and where there are wars, there's gluttony. It doesn't take much to invert the equation. It does take a certain moral degeneracy. But hell, how relevant is that? Genuine vultures at least wait for the corpses, wait to smell the sweet stench of their rot, before swooping down and feasting on it. Human vultures create them. The threats, the corpses, the battlefields. And profit from them.
We've been swarmed enough recently, by human vultures. They don't have quite the same grace as the originals. Mebbe they got pretty houses, and big cars, and crazy parties. Gated mansions and dark cars. Mebbe their kids burn cash in nightclubs, and designer stores, and private schools and elite universities and so on. Mebbe they've got enough role models. Mebbe there are enough vultures out there. Maybe they're all in the flock, understand each other. They've got their role, apparently. I can't quite admire them.
But I do admire the real vultures waiting on roadkill, on accidents and death. They launch up and coast, ride what air there is, for the day. They've got style. They know what they're doing. And there's nothing wrong, with that feral instinct, that carnal exultance, their viscerality. And I do respect that they wait for death, instead of creating it. There's a lot of human vultures out there, at least in the DC area. They might be pretending not to understand their complicity. But they're responsible, for the corpses, that they're feasting on. Hard for me to consider that glory.