Amoebae
[2008-03-27]

We are an endangered species.

sound: Phil Dadson
Buenos Aires, 2008

animation: L.R.
London 2008

Orange garbage bags on London streets
are like the people in Conversation Piece,
an installation by Juan Munos, in the Tate Modern.

I imagined them with amoebas
moving to the sound of Antarctic rocks.

Diatoms, amoebae and the planktons
remind me of icons in Indigenous art.
I am shown a book: Tales of Norkomis,
of stories told to its writer, Patronella Johnston,
by an old Indian woman of the Ojibwa nation,
who had lived her one hundred and third year.
There I find circles and ovals variously embellished,
representing the sun, corn, and Happy Hunting Ground.
As in Australian Aboriginal story,
the existence of plants and animals
is explained through the actions of spirits
who created the earth and mankind.

The tiny creatures of the sea,
the diatoms, amoebae and the planktons,
may serve as icons for our native selves.

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