Earth, Hearth, Home

The turkey vultures gather more tightly together now, their spiraling kettles boil overhead, more active with each new day. I know that they are gathering for the yearly flight south, four years here and I know that much of this desert, if not much else. How they know it is time to go is still a mystery to me and I suspect even to those who write and speak as though they know don’t really know. Was it the short cold spell that came and went two weeks ago? Now, the days have turned hot again, not as hot as this desert can be in high summer but nothing in the air speaks of fall or gives a sign of autumn coming.

In the time of their gathering, stillness comes over the desert landscape. Brilliant bright days pass. The summer sky that was so blue and thin, like fragile shell of a robin, and felt like it could break at the wrong though now thickens, becomes a deeper blue, almost like the sea. The burning glare of a summer sun that felt too close to the ground fades. Clouds drift across the land in gray and lavender and white. Are these the clues of autumn? The vultures do not tell us. They simply gather and circle in silent conclaves above, soaring in the great blue vault like a red hatted cardinals discussing important issues far beyond mere human understanding.

Cathartes aura is the scientific name for Turkey Vultures. “Cathartes” means purifier, and is an apt description of the life of these large birds. They are purifiers of the land.

To First Nation peoples, the Turkey Vulture was the manifestation of the Thunder Bird, the deliverer of the power of life and death, emissaries of the Great Spirit. Vultures led the final act of the ceremony known as “sky burial.” At day’s end, like red hooded pallbearers, the vultures carried the remaining bits of a life back into the landscape, food for themselves and their young, a fitting reminder that life lives on in death, and that through this transformation, death is purified into new life.

Full of power when in the air, on the ground these birds are clownish, moving in awkward hops, wings outstretched as if to embrace, their naked, featherless faces painted red with a touch of blue. They appear foolish.

“In our Indian belief, the clown has a power which comes from the thunder beings, not from the animals or the Earth. He has more power than the atom bomb, he could blow off the dome of the Capitol. Being a clown gives you honor, but also shame. It brings you power, but you have to pay for it.” John Fire Lame Deer

The vultures pay for their power with our misunderstanding. We fail to understand that in this aspect, appearing as “clown” they represent the greatest power of Thunder Bird, the self sacrifice of creation.
It has been told that,

“In the earliest of times, the sun lived very close to the earth – so close in fact that life upon the earth was becoming unbearable. The animal world got together and decided to do something about it. They wanted to move the sun further away.

     Fox was the first to volunteer, and he grabbed the sun in his mouth and began to run to the heavens. After a short while, the sun became too hot, burning the fox’s mouth, and he stopped. To this day, the inside of the fox’s mouth is black.

     Then Opossum volunteered. He wrapped his tail around the sun and began running toward the heavens. Before long the sun became too hot, burning his tail, and he had to stop. To this day the opossum has no hair upon its tail.

     It was then that Vulture stepped forward. Vulture was the most beautiful and powerful of birds. Upon his head was a beautiful mantle of rich feathering that all other birds envied. Knowing that the earth would burn up unless someone moved the sun, Vulture placed his head against it and began to fly to the heavens. With powerful strokes of his wings, he pushed the sun further and further into the heavens. Though he could feel his crown-feathers burning, Vulture continued until the sun was set in the sky at a safe distance from the earth. Unfortunately, Vulture lost his magnificent head of feathers for eternity.”

     Summer changes to autumn in this desert with no sign more dramatic than these conclaves. No trees announce with gaudy finery the end of summer, no cold winds tear through the land plucking the trees clean. The arrival of autumn is proclaimed only by the silent gathering of these great birds, soaring above the landscape on their six-foot wings, wings so large they could be mistaken for dark angels. The wind rushes through their wing-tips, feathers moving as though fingers are playing the unseen heavenly instrument called our soul.