The Unblinking Eyes Of Sleeping Elephants

In the beginning of time, the skies were filled with flying elephants.
Too heavy for their wings, they sometimes crashed through the trees
and frightened other animals.

All the flying grey elephants migrated to the source of the Ganges.
They agreed to renounce their wings and settle on the earth.
When they molted millions of wings fell to the earth,
the snow covered them, and the Himalayas were born.

Grant Green: Idle Moments


The blue elephants landed in the sea and their wings became fins.
They are the whales, the trunkless elephants of the oceans.
Their cousins are the manatees, the trunkless elephants of the rivers.
The chameleon elephants kept their wings
but agreed never to land on earth.
They change colors of their feathers every day. Today they are azure,
and when it rains they are the color of pearls.

When they go to sleep, the chameleon elephants always lie down
in the same place in the sky and dream with one eye open.
The stars you see at night are the unblinking eyes of sleeping elephants,
who sleep with one eye open to best keep watch over us.

--Gregory Colbert
Ashes and Snow