I am noticing these metaphors more and more in my contemporary reading adventures. They hurt something inside of me that grew as I grew, with nature first and human technology somewhere far behind. These painful similes and metaphors glare out from the printed page, maliciously daring me to read them; the sound of rain like a badly tuned radio, trees so tall they liken a skyscraper. Backwards, sideways, and all mixed up. How could we have so forgotten where we came from?
Rain was the prelude to music; it was our first lullaby, with promises tucked away of a songbird joyfully trilling in the sweet morning rain. A welcome rain, pitter-pattering softly on the gentle leaves of an aged maple. We bore music out of our affection for it. Music which much, much later gave rise to the radio, even the cacophony of radio static, yet never have I heard a rain that sounded with the shattering discord of a badly tuned radio.
Trees have always been the silent and mysterious beings that devote their lives to reaching for the sun. They have taught us the joys of sudden vistas as we climbed within their boughs. We incorporated these joys into our homes and our windows as our species rose. A tree is meandering, flowing, and ever dynamic. A building has become a static block of hard angles to keep at bay the very animals that make their homes within the trees. Aye, the tree is a world apart from a building, and a building has moved far beyond the likeness of a tree.
When did the writers of the realm begin this shift whereupon the wild is comprehended by comparison to technology and civilization? It seems so sad a case for our collective imagination.
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