Alien Earth

Silence. It was Angelo’s turn to answer, but he was staring at his seed.

“Angelo?” Daniel prompted gently.

“Oh. All the giraffe plants made seeds?”

“Right. Why do you suppose they did that?”

Connie’s turn. “Uh, maybe because they got kind of smashed in the storm, so they knew that maybe some of them would stop being alive.”

“That’s right. The storm was the biological stimulus that made them all make seeds. Today was a nice still day, with no wind, and all the seeds were ripe. So, what did they do?”

“Opened up.” Gabriel never spoke a word more than was necessary.

“That’s right. They opened up and then they all quivered. What did we notice when they quivered?”

“They were pretty, like dancers?” Marta whispered her answer. It was wrong. Marta was almost always wrong, but she still had to be given her chance to answer. And Daniel always tried to make it seem like she was kind of right. He was that kind of teacher.

“Of course, Marta. They were beautiful, like dancers, and they smelled pretty, too. And that pretty smell was how the giraffe plants say to each other, ‘I’m still alive and fine. Don’t send a seed over here!’”

Even Connie had to giggle at the funny voice Daniel used when he tried to be a giraffe plant talking.

“But,” he said, suddenly serious. “One giraffe plant couldn’t send that message.” He spoke quickly now, to get past the bad part. “It was dead. A seed was needed there. And when Angelo’s plant didn’t find any pretty smell coming from its direction, it turned toward the no-smell place. Now”—and Daniel’s voice suddenly got cheery again—“this is what will happen. Angelo’s plant will send the seed over there on a long stalk. We’ll all have to be very careful for a time, whenever we walk past Angelo’s kifa patch, to make sure we don’t step on that stalk or hurt it in any way. Soon the seed will get to where the old giraffe plant was, and the stalk will push it down into the dirt. Then a new giraffe plant will grow and that kifa moss will come back into balance again and be all healthy.”

Daniel looked at each child in turn. “Did you all notice that all the plants opened their flowers at once? That’s so they all have the same chance to spread a seed. But of course the chance always goes to the plant most likely to succeed.”

“Daniel?”

Everyone turned to look at Sherry. It was her turn to answer, but Daniel hadn’t asked a question. Still, it was her right to speak, but she could have waited until Daniel asked if anyone had any questions. Connie didn’t like it when people did things not quite right. It made her stomach feel funny.

“Do you have a question, Sherry?” Daniel asked, almost making it okay.

“What would happen if two giraffe plants sent seeds?”

“That doesn’t happen, Sherry,” Daniel said gently but firmly. “The sweet smell lets all the plants know where the next one is, and how big the cooperative patch is. The closest giraffe plant reseeds the missing place. And the outside plants don’t send seeds outward because the patches are always five plants by five plants.”

“Why?”

It wasn’t even Sherry’s turn anymore. Connie held her mouth tight, waiting for Daniel to get angry. Instead, he just sighed.

“Sherry, you should know why by now. The kifa moss patches are all part of Castor’s ecology. Too many kifa patches or too big of a patch would not be good for Castor. What do we say, always?”

“One planet, one ecosystem, one life,” the children chorused.

Sherry was going to open her mouth again, but Daniel said quickly, “Now, let’s all share with our kifa patches, and then we’ll go over to our weaving.” He immediately set an example, turning aside to urinate at the base of the pitcher plant that was at the northeast corner of an unoccupied kifa patch. All the children followed his example, sharing with their patches the fluids of their own lives. When all were finished, Daniel nodded, and they stepped out together, walking in their rows behind him as he led them off to the weaving shelter.

Of stars and the voids I sing, and of a kinless race,

Who suckled their Mother Earth dry, and wept not

At her barrenness, but abandoned her to death.

New worlds they found, and set aside their wolf’s teeth

To don the fleeces of sheep. But even sheep will overgraze

The grass. Their brown dung will spot the glorious green hillsides

In piles too large for the soil to kindly absorb….

John twitched in his sleep. No good, no good. Didn’t scan, and he wasn’t sure if sheep dung had been brown. Wouldn’t it be greenish, from their diet of grass?

“Write what you know!” the poetry master bellowed, and snatched John’s poem from his desk. The words flew loose, to scatter on the floor. “I don’t want to read about sheep or grass! Anyone can write some pastoral trash modeled on the old poets! Your task is to the poets of your own generation and time. Your poetry must be who you are and when you are and what you are, or it’s worthless!”

Dr. Crandall was panting with the strength of his emotions. John rose silently from his seat to gather the scattered words of his thoughts. What if I don’t want to be from this time, he wanted to shout. What if I want to know how my ancestors felt and thought and smelt? What if the only way we can really understand their poetry is to pretend to be them for a while? But he didn’t shout the words, not even in this dream.