I’m pleased to have “Trickster Raven” included in the first issue of Luna Arcana, an Arts & Cultural Print Journal from the Mojave High Desert.
I’ve posted the piece below.
Trickster Raven
In the creation mythologies of the Pacific Northwest, the Trickster called Raven was present when the floodwaters that covered the earth first receded. He strutted up and down on a beautiful beach. The ocean waves glittered like diamonds with light from the sun that Raven had placed in the sky. It was pretty but lifeless. Raven sighed. He was lonely and bored.
A muffled squeaking sound caught his attention and led him to a giant clamshell half buried in the sand. Raven peered into the crack between the halves of the shell. There were some tiny creatures inside, cowering in fear. Delighted by this break in the monotony of his day, Raven crooned to the creatures to come out. They didn’t. But when he presented them with berries plucked from a nearby bush, the first human beings tumbled out, frail and hungry. Humans quickly became Raven’s favorite playthings.
The peoples who first told Raven’s stories speak of a mythic time before our time, a time when anything was possible and the rules that govern us had not yet settled into place. The Creator gave Raven special powers and asked him to act on behalf of all the animal and human peoples of the earth. Raven brought important gifts like fire and light and a variety of foods. He killed monsters. He taught humans how to hunt and cook and laugh. There were a few mishaps, like the time that he let death enter the world, but all in all he got a good start.
That time is over and the earth has changed. The ancient sea that once covered Southern California receded into mile deep sand centuries ago. Today the Mojave bears little resemblance to the damp, green forests and beaches littered with driftwood, where the story of Raven and the clamshell is still told. Many things are gone, including some of the old gods. But Tricksters like Raven occupy the middle ground between past and present. They are perennial travelers, drawn to edges and borders, simultaneously erasing and creating boundaries as they stroll around the world they are still shaping. Raven the Trickster is still here.
The Common Raven, corvus corax, is ubiquitous throughout the American West and the Mojave Desert. These shiny black birds are not exactly Trickster Raven. Trickster Raven is a timeless cosmic dynamic, an amoral demi-god that embodies change and paradox, not a mortal animal. But you can learn a lot about Trickster Raven by observing the ravens that wing their way over the dusty desert hills, and Trickster is someone you definitely want to know.
Like Trickster, the common raven is a conman, charismatic, talkative, and highly intelligent. His prodigious appetite for food and all types of stimulation leads him to invent new tools, traps, and games. He looks for openings and plays all the angles. Like Trickster Raven, corvus corax doesn’t lose sleep over the half-eaten hotdog he snatched from your picnic table or the baby tortoise he devoured. Niceties don’t concern him although he occasionally does a human being a good turn. Whether this is by design or accident is a mystery. The possible significance and meaning of these acts is left to you to decipher.
As the world that we know neared completion, Trickster Raven’s lust and appetite smothered his common sense more and more frequently. He was more Fool than Hero, more malicious than benign. The stories of his exploits illuminate the limits of this present-day world and remind us of the need to respect them. Like Raven, humans have an assigned role to play in the ongoing creation of this place, and we learn the same lessons over and over again. We chatter and squabble, invent and tinker, bring light and darkness into the world. For better and for worse, Trickster Raven is our patron. The reflection you see in his glittering black eye may be your own.
