Who Turned the Devil Loose?

There came the day

There came the day when the forces of the universe were turned loose upon the flowers and the fields. On that day it was as though Lucifer himself dug out from the center of the earth and had come to the surface.

Flowers turned color. Trees toppled. Antelopes were taken to who-knows-where. That was a scary, scary day. Neighbors gathered around, holding hands and exhorting the spirits and the cosmic ones to contain things - to send back the winds of woe and wildness to the place from which they had come.

Year after year

Earth had been going along, year after year, decade after decade, century following the many centuries since the shrinking of the oceans and the rising of the rocks. Dirt followed the rocks, as did pretty flowers everyone admires, and, too, the creatures that dined on flowers. We celebrated their beauty when, finally, we also arrived.

We named the water that fell on us as it tried to refill the oceans. We called it rain. Antelopes did not call the rain, rain. They were too busy eating those flowers we liked to admire so much, and our antelope friends were almost too busy to eat the flowers for fear of being, themselves, eaten by hungry beasts and the many tiny bugs that sought them for dinner both day and night.

Pretty flowers did not talk of the rain. They drank all of it that they could hold. Rain brightened their moods and blushed their cheeks. Sometimes the rain would be late in arriving, and the flowers' heads would droop in sadness. When the next rain finally arrived, the flowers straightened up and waved upward toward the clouds that emptied themselves of the little drops of happiness.

Bottomless pit

But, on that day of Lucifer when winds whipped the branches and trees fell over, the antelope was caught up in an angular black hole - a vortex with devilish corners - a bottomless pit without a beginning and without an end. Someone had surely turned the Devil loose.

Luciferian climate change

Around and around whirled the daisies, unable to understand which way to point themselves to ask for help and for raindrop happiness.

The sunflower bud grew red spickles and dark green blades from its earlier gentle green. It understood that its giant yellow and brown flower inside was not to show its big black and shiny seeds ever again.

Red poppies turned their color from cheerful rosy-red to icy white and cold purple-blue, suffering in the strange radiation that came to be known as evil.

Orchids shuddered in the wind and wished that their roots were deep into the dirt. Most smart flowers were that way, even those of lesser beauty.

Little ladybugs turned from red to green and contorted themselves from round to sharply square as they tried to hide in bright blue cornflower petals. Those cornflowers were so embarrassed that their petals blushed scarlet red.

Why, why, why?

People wonder about such assaults, the ones carried out by one part of nature on other parts of nature. People ask, "Why?" Usually there is no good answer to that question.

Often it can be heard that "Someone turned the Devil loose again." Even as that can be heard from time to time and from place to place, elsewhere that Devil is at work planning the next assault.

Often, too, people guess at where the Devil may be hiding and carrying on, plotting away. There is ordinarily no way to know the whereabouts of that location. A typical supposition is that "The Devil is in 'The Details.'"

But none can tell another where "The Details" place may be. Even the Pope in Rome does not know where "The Details" is located. Were its map coordinates to be revealed some day, count on it that bombs will fall. The Devil will celebrate, for bombs make the Devil as happy as do raindrops make daisies smile.

Be all of this as it may be, there are some lessons to be learned by those of us who care enough to want to learn.

There may be a considerable problem in listing and explaining the lessons in need of learning.

It would probably be best to look at the flowers when they are at their happiest, sprinkled with raindrops from time to time, ready to be eaten by antelopes and bugs, whichever gets to them first, or when they are able to stand up in the wind and breezes as do their tall brothers and sisters, the trees.

Perhaps the real lessons all must learn - Accept nature and all the rest of it as it is. Leave the Devil to the Devil's own devices. Hope for rain when the earth is dry and for sunshine when the floods occur. See beauty where it is allowed, and do what you can, constructive things, when you encounter that which is ugly. Think thoughts of value. Value those thoughts that make both you and nature smile.

Just thinking about it - Perhaps "The Details" place is in ourselves, or maybe it is in daisies and antelopes and ladybugs. Then, the next question might become, "How does that big and constantly active Devil fit inside so restricted a place - 'The Details?'"

Enough !

We just might want to leave devilish questions and answers for another time so as to not take away from all of the bright color and natural good order of things whether or not the Devil stays in "The Details" place and we hide from the Devil in ours.