by Tamara Gray
‘I will give you the leaping and the running power,’ said the earth, ‘and I will give you the flying power. The swimming power will soon be yours and so will the curling and coiling and twisting and bending powers. I will give you the power of excellent eyesight and the power to make yourself as small as possible, just in case.’
And so it was that, with these unaccustomed powers, the elephant leapt and ran and flew and swam all over the earth looking for his fellow elephants. He picked up small creatures in his tusks that curled and coiled and twisted and bent, and he asked the small creatures if they’d seen his fellow elephants. At night he made himself as small as possible so that he could sleep in tiny rock caves and not feel so alone. But the elephant did not find his fellow elephants because elephants do not live in the air, nor do they live in rivers or lakes, nor in tiny rock caves. And the elephant’s fellows never saw him because they were not looking for a leaping elephant or a flying elephant or even a swimming elephant. Nor were they looking for an elephant with tusks that curled and coiled and twisted and bent. Or an elephant who could make himself as small as could be. And even if they had been looking for such an elephant, their eyesight was so poor that they would have missed him.
So the earth, who had truly meant to help the elephant, had not helped him at all.
And so it was that, on a day when the elephant was flying over a red desert in the heart of the heart of Africa, he saw five creatures in a huddle on the ground. He was so pleased to find other creatures because he had been by himself for so long that he flew down straight away, and his heart fluttered and jumped.
‘I’m looking for my fellow elephants,’ he said in his soft sad bleat, ‘have you seen them?’
‘No,’ snarled the lion.
‘No,’ cawed the eagle.
‘No,’ hissed the fish.
‘No,’ spat the snake.
And the huge hyrax* just looked at the elephant and did not say a word.
The lion curled his lips up over his teeth and said: ‘We’d only see your fellow elephants if they came right up to us, right here in the red desert. We can’t go anywhere because you have the powers that are rightfully ours. I can’t leap or run.’
‘And I can’t fly, or see properly.’
‘I can’t swim.’
‘And I can’t curl or coil or twist or bend.’
And the huge hyrax just looked at the elephant and did not say a word.
The elephant felt hot all over and he bellowed. And his bellow blasted past the lump in his throat, and he stamped his feet and the earth shuddered.
‘This is very wrong,’ bellowed the elephant. ‘The earth has given me powers that were never meant for me, powers that are rightfully yours.’
The elephant stamped his feet heavily on the dry earth and his huge ears flapped backwards and forwards and then he charged. And as the elephant charged across the red desert he bellowed to the earth: ‘Give these creatures back their rightful powers this minute! THIS MINUTE!’
But the earth, even though she was frightened of the elephant, remained silent. She had fallen in love with the young bull elephant and so she wanted him to have all the powers. She would not help the other creatures.
After a while the elephant stopped bellowing and he stopped charging, and then he felt the lump in his throat once more. He looked helplessly at the creatures and his skin tingled and water flowed from his eyes and his knees went weak. The elephant’s tired body collapsed onto the earth. He didn’t know what to do.
But the creatures, who thought the elephant was just putting on a show and didn’t really want to give them back their rightful powers, suddenly and heartlessly attacked him.
‘If you won’t give us back our rightful powers,’ snarled the lion who could not leap or run, ‘we’ll just take them,’ and he tore into the elephant’s legs.
‘Rightfully ours, rightfully ours,’ cawed the eagle who could not fly and could not see properly. And he made a blind lunge for one of the elephant’s ears with his sharp pointed beak.
The elephant’s skin tingled and his knees went so weak that he was glad he wasn’t standing up.
‘They’re not yours, they’re not yours,’ hissed the fish who could not swim, and she scratched her prickly scales up and down the elephant’s body.
‘Kill him, kill him and then the powers will be rightfully ours,’ spat out the snake who could not curl or coil or twist or bend.
The heartless creatures tore at the elephant until they were exhausted, but still the lion could not leap or run and the eagle could not fly or see properly. The fish still could not swim and the snake could not curl or coil or twist or bend.
Only the huge hyrax did not attack the elephant. He just turned his head away and did not say a word.
‘I think the elephant is dying,’ spat the snake who could not curl or coil or twist or bend, ‘and still he has the powers that are rightfully ours.’
And then a deep voice boomed out across the red desert. ‘The powers cannot be taken,’ said the voice, ‘they can only be given.’
The deep voice was Zushkaali’s voice, the wise man of those times. He spoke as he strode towards the creatures. His long striped tunic billowed on the wind and the sash of his striped turban streamed out behind him.
The creatures hung their heads because they knew that Zushkaali the Wise always spoke the truth, and they knew he was angry with them.
‘From the day the earth gave the elephant all the powers,’ said Zushkaali, ‘they have been his to use as he will. And if he so wishes, he can give the powers away, but they cannot be taken from him.’
The elephant heard Zushkaali’s deep strong voice and his soft sad bleat squeezed past the lump in his throat. Now he knew just what to do. ‘I would like to give each of you,’ he said, lifting his head and setting his jaws down squarely on the ground, ‘the powers that are rightfully yours.’
The elephant’s jaws rattled on the dry ground and the lump, which was now brittle and hard, rattled in the back of his throat when he spoke.
The elephant looked first at the lame lion who hung his head because he was ashamed of what he’d done to the elephant. ‘I give you the leaping and the running power,’ rattled out the elephant, ‘for these are the powers that are rightfully yours.’
The lame lion felt his legs filling up with the leaping and the running power and the elephant’s legs collapsed and grew weak. The lame lion’s legs grew stronger and stronger until, with one powerful bound, he leapt over the elephant’s body and away into the red desert.
‘Now you, earthbound, almost blind eagle,’ said the elephant in his voice with the rattle in it.
The eagle who could not fly stood awkwardly, trying to balance the weight of his useless wings. He too hung his head and, at that moment, he was glad he could not see properly.
‘I give you the flying power and the power of excellent eyesight,’ said the elephant. ‘For those are the powers that are rightfully yours.’
The earthbound eagle felt his wings filling up with the flying power and when he spread his wings and flapped them a little, he soared effortlessly into the air, while the elephant’s wing-ears collapsed and shrank and he felt the flying power drain out of them. And when the eagle looked down as he flew over the red desert he found that his eyesight was so restored that he could distinguish grains of sand one from the other, while the elephant’s vision grew cloudy and short-sighted and he closed his eyes.
The fish who could not swim came next, but she could not look at the dying elephant either. Instead she simply scratched her scales across the sand and, when she reached the elephant, she stayed very still by his side.
‘I give you the swimming power,’ said the elephant, his voice now loud with the rattles and his eyes still closed, ‘for that is the power that is rightfully yours.’ The fish who lived on dry land scraped her way to the river bank and when she reached the river, the swimming power had so filled her body that she swam strongly and well. By the ti
me the sun rose the next day she was swimming in the sea.
The elephant’s voice rattled on and the stiff awkward snake hauled herself up onto the elephant’s trunk and heaved herself awkwardly through the curls and the coils and the twists and the bends of the elephant’s great white tusks.
‘I give you the curling and the coiling, the twisting and the bending powers,’ rattled out the elephant, ‘for these are the powers that are rightfully yours.’ The stiff awkward snake felt the powers surge into her stiff awkward body and then she curled and coiled and twisted and bent her way across the red desert, while the elephant’s tusks hardened and straightened themselves along the red sand on either side of his mouth. All these things the elephant sensed rather than saw, because his eyesight was by now so poor.
And at last the huge hyrax who had not said a word stood right in front of the elephant. He was as tall as the elephant’s head and all he wanted was to be as small as possible. The elephant’s voice was wracked with rattles but when he felt the huge hyrax’s breath on his trunk he managed to say, ‘You did not attack me... and that makes you a brother.’ And then after a long pause he said, ‘Say after me: I want to be small, as small as can be,’ and here the elephant’s rattling voice failed him.
The huge hyrax opened and shut his mouth, but because he could not say a word, not a word came out. Just then the elephant coughed and the brittle lump at the back of his throat flew out of his mouth. At exactly the same time the huge hyrax breathed in and he felt something vibrating wildly against the back of his throat. He almost choked, then he coughed and his cough had a rattle in it, and then he spoke, and his voice was the elephant’s voice, the voice with a rattle in it.
‘I want to be small, as small as can be.’
The huge hyrax was thrilled with his new rattling voice. He so liked the sound of it that he added some words of his own; and each time he rattled out the words he shrank a size, and when he was very small he ran up the elephant’s trunk and kissed the elephant on his forehead.
‘Thank you,’ said the very small hyrax in his rattling voice, ‘thank you.’
‘Thank YOU,’ said the elephant, ‘for not …’, and then he stopped because his voice wasn’t rattling and the brittle lump was gone. He started again. ‘Thank you for not attacking me and for taking away the rattle and the lump.’ The very small hyrax gave the elephant another kiss and then he scuttled down the elephant’s trunk and away into the red desert. The elephant’s heart fluttered and jumped as he listened until even he, whose hearing had always been good, could no longer hear the very small hyrax.
The earth’s heart was fluttering and jumping too. She wanted to speak to the elephant, but her voice was choked with tears so her clouds burst open and poured out their rain on the elephant whose blood had spilled all around him on the earth. Night fell and the elephant slept and while he was sleeping Zushkaali the Wise knelt beside him. He soothed the elephant with his hands and with his voice, but he saw that the elephant’s wounds were grave, so he summoned the spiders.
‘Come quickly,’ he said, ‘come very quickly.’
The spiders crawled out from under stones all across the red desert and when they reached the elephant they began to spin their healing webs. The spiders hummed a healing hum as they spun out their healing webs, and the earth rained down her tears.
Zushkaali the Wise sat by the elephant until the earth dried her tears and the sun made the raindrops sparkle on the spiders’ healing webs which, by then, covered all the elephant’s wounds.
‘I am so sorry,’ said the earth. Her voice was crystal clear after the rain, ‘I loved you so much that I wanted you to have everything, all the powers, everything that I could give you. I never meant to do you any harm.’
‘I know,’ said the elephant in a new strong voice. ‘I know that you meant well.’ The elephant kissed the earth. ‘Anyone could have made the same mistake,’ he said and the earth’s heart fluttered and jumped and the elephant’s heart fluttered and jumped and then the elephant stood up. The spiders’ healing webs clung to his body.
Zushkaali the Wise led the elephant to a newly filled watering hole. As he walked, the elephant trod carefully to avoid squashing any sleeping spiders. When he reached the watering hole the elephant took a long drink and then he looked into Zushkaali’s wide green eyes.
‘Strange things have happened to me since I lost my fellow elephants,’ he said. ‘First the earth gave me powers that were not rightfully mine,’ the elephant looked at Zushkaali, ‘and I gave them back. But a lump grew in my throat and water spilled from my eyes. My skin tingled and my knees went weak. My heart has been fluttering and jumping up and down and I got hot all over and I bellowed and I charged and I stamped my feet. What are these things, Zushkaali?’ said the elephant. ‘What has been happening to me?’
‘What’s been happening to you,’ said Zushkaali, ‘is what the human creatures call feelings. Feelings have been happening to you.’
‘What are feelings?’ said the elephant.
‘I’ll tell you as we travel,’ said Zushkaali the Wise, and so the elephant knelt down and Zushkaali climbed onto his back just behind his huge ears that had, until so very recently, been his wings.
They travelled together across the red desert and as the sash from Zushkaali’s turban billowed out behind them like a flag, and the spiders’ healing webs fell away when they’d done their healing work, Zushkaali told the elephant everything he wanted to know.
‘The feeling that comes when your eyes spill over with water and a lump grows in your throat,’ said Zushkaali, ‘is called sadness. Sadness comes if you are by yourself for too long, or if someone you love dies. The water that spilled from your eyes are called tears. And just before the tears come a lump grows in your throat that makes it difficult to speak.’
‘Sadness,’ repeated the elephant. ‘Tears.’ And he remembered what happened when he looked up and saw that his fellow elephants weren’t there any more.
‘The feeling that comes when your skin tingles and your knees feel weak is called fear,’ said Zushkaali.
‘Fear,’ repeated the elephant, and he remembered what happened when the creatures attacked him.
‘Fear comes when you’re worried that you might be hurt, or when you don’t feel very safe,’ said Zushkaali.
They travelled on in silence for a while until Zushkaali said, ‘And the feeling that comes when your heart flutters and jumps up and down is called happiness. Some call it joy.’
‘Happiness,’ repeated the elephant, ‘joy.’ And he remembered all the times that his heart had fluttered and jumped and particularly he remembered how it had fluttered and jumped when the hyrax had kissed him.
‘Happiness and joy come for many reasons,’ said Zushkaali, ‘but they are especially near when you are close to the creatures you love, when you are close to your fellow creatures. And last but not least,’ said Zushkaali, ‘the feeling that comes when you get hot all over and bellow and charge and stamp your feet is called anger. Anger often comes when somebody does something that is wrong.’
‘Anger,’ repeated the elephant, and he remembered what had happened when he realised that the earth had given him the powers that were not rightfully his.
Zushkaali and the elephant travelled on in silence, and this time the silence lasted for a long time. And then, at last, the elephant asked Zushkaali about a word that he’d been wondering about ever since he’d heard Zushkaali say it.
‘What is love?’ said the elephant. But just as the elephant asked that question he heard and smelled his fellow elephants ahead. He heard them slooshing water all over each other and he knew by the smell that they were at their favourite watering hole. He heard them trumpeting. And then the elephant’s heart turned a somersault and he longed to curl his trunk around his fellow elephants and rub himself up against them. He walked faster.
‘The feeling that you are feeling now is called love,’ said Zushkaali.
The elephant walked faste
r and faster and Zushkaali the Wise held onto the elephant’s ears with both hands so that he wouldn’t fall off. The elephant ran as fast as elephants can towards his fellow elephants.
‘And to feel all these feelings,’ said Zushkaali, bouncing up and down behind the elephant’s ears and laughing, ‘and to know what they are called is the power that is rightfully yours.’
When, at last, the elephant was reunited with his fellow elephants he showed them just how he felt about them. When they understood what he was showing them, they showed him that they felt the same love for him, the same sadness when he was not with them, the same fear when they didn’t know where to find him, the same happiness and the same joy when they saw him coming back, and the same anger with the earth for giving him the powers that were not rightfully his so that they wouldn’t recognise him even if they had seen him.
The young bull elephant told his fellow elephants the names of all these feelings, so they now understood that, like the lion and the eagle, like the fish and the snake, and like the smallest little hyrax with his voice with the rattle in it, they all possessed the powers that were rightfully theirs.
‘And the rightful powers for an elephant,’ said the elephant, ‘are the feeling powers.’
And since that time so very long ago in the heart of the heart of Africa, every elephant has felt these feelings, and that is why they, of all the creatures, are the most like us, the human creatures.
* Small ungulate mammal of Africa and Asia with rodent-like teeth and feet with hoof-like toes. The closest living relative to the Elephant!.
And the Dolphin Smiled
by Jin Pyn Lee
Once, where the river met the ocean full of yellow, red, orange and blue, there lived a dolphin and a boy.
Everyday the dolphin and the boy would play.
They would tell each other stories of the world as they saw it in their own ways.