Jack Burns Lives!

Nearly Twenty Years Gone

Edward Abbey died on this day in 1989, but his message and relevance did not. Great art, music, architecture, craftsmanship and literature stand the test of time, and to date, the words of the bard have stood that test. Perhaps those words are even more relevant today as when they were written.

When considering the major themes of Abbey’s writing within the context of today’s world, not quite twenty years removed, the relevance is plain to see. Little has changed since he first penned Desert Solitaire, except for perhaps for magnitude of the battle. His words have become prophetic even, as humans now find themselves in a struggle for not only individual liberty but for life itself. Other species have faced and experienced extinction. Now we face it ourselves and purely from our own ignorance.

The commingling of government and corporate interests is complete, as a once dysfunctional, codependent but separate relationship has become a single, fully coalesced behemoth of unimaginable proportions, gobbling up anything in its way. Abbey’s blob in its most frightening, final, fiendish form. Hell, the United States Corporate Killing Machine spends $5 billion dollars a month killing things in Iraq and Afghanistan alone.

Abbey accurately portrayed how it was in his vast collection of colorfully written essays and where we were ultimately headed in his fictional and unfortunately prophetic Good News.

A few have soldiered on, trying to pick up the pieces after we lost him. Some in the field, doing the important work on the front lines, battling corporate criminals. Rapists of the land. Others in the classroom. Still others with the pen, the keyboard or in song. But all of us are on the same sheet of music, trying to bring some rationality to our society, some reasonable balance between economics and preservation. Some call it sustainability, but sustainability has unfortunately become the word du jour for the wrong reasons, something hijacked by economic opportunists.

Several days ago, I was having a meltdown of sorts, frustrated by meddling, corporate lackeys and the pressure they attempt to force into my life. I escaped to the garden and soaked up some late winter rays. Sitting beside some hearty sage and rosemary that had survived the winter, I watched the birds and pondered the spring planting. And in just a few short moments, it was all behind me. Wiped from my mind like it had never been there. No phones. No e-mail. No quarterly reports. Nothing more than the song of the robin and the quiet call of the Mourning dove.

I also thought of Edward Abbey and his opening lines in Solitaire. How he once sat, like I, and soaked up the incredible experience of his environment. How nature was his refuge and how he devoted his life to its protection. Fortunately for us, he wrote about that experience and penned the words that would one day make him a hero and legend among conservationists.

I missed him and thought about how wonderful it would be to hear that a new Abbey book was being released and that he was still there, grumpy as ever.

But he’s not with us. The torch has passed to those that read and embraced his provocative words, ideas and never yielding passion. It’s now up to us to speak for the voiceless. For the trees, for the owl, the lynx and the grizz. The rocks and mountains. All the things worth saving. And let me tell you, Wall Street, mortgage bankers and developers ain’t high on my list. Fuck those assholes. Reap what you’ve sown and enjoy some hind tit for a spell. Oil companies, get ready. You’re next.

As Abbey said, “The idea of wilderness doesn’t need defending. It only needs more defenders.”

ONWARD