Raven

by Chester Case

I. News Item: “Mourning Ravens Perform Rites for Fallen Comrade”

Two ravens circled overhead in close, wing-to-wing formation above an improvised grave site as Posh Squash gardeners buried the dead raven they'd found when they arrived to work on Tuesday morning, November 12, 2002. The gardeners said there were no signs of violence or injury to the fallen raven. Why or how it died is not known. Presumably, the dead raven was one of the several ravens who often visited the Posh Squash. The mourning pair broke off its circling and flew off into the canyon when the burial was finished. They have not been seen since.

II. Ravens Passing

At Coffeetime during a late November work party to winterize the Garden, a Gardener who buried Raven told a story about the ravens to the Gardeners gathered at the tables under the nearly leafless cherry tree.

We didn’t see Raven at first. Once you saw it...him or her, how would you know?...you couldn’t not see it. It was as glossy black as in life, but so earth-bound and inert, wings loosely folded, legs flexed up. This aerial acrobat. Folded not too tidy like an old black umbrella. I didn’t see any injury but then I didn’t feel right about poking around. I did see that one eye was an empty red socket. There was an out-of-place wad of dirt on the tip of its beak. What killed it? Or did it just die?

Over to the west out of sight high in an old pine tree, another raven called and called, as if commenting and maybe, lamenting.

I got the mattock and a shovel and dug a deep hole down past the Compost Works under the pear tree. A few inches of soil then the rocks. Native rock, native soil. Now the other raven, or there may have been two, kept up this solemn calling, tok tok tok, k-k-k-rrrakk.

I picked up the corpse. A raven glided out of its tree. It began to circle overhead. Tight circles centered over the grave. I laid Raven in the grave, on its side. Those strong, stiff wing feathers. Dirt and pebbles from my shovel rattled on Raven’s feathers.

As I mounded the dirt, another raven glided in. There were now two of them, calling to one another and maybe me. They flew tight circles in that effortless raven way, a balletic wing-tip to wing-tip formation, rising and falling slightly, round and round, over the grave. It seemed right for me to shape a mound and pile it with some of the rocks from the hole, and to sink a stake upright to mark the spot.

I joined the other Gardeners. We watched in silence and I guess some kind of awe as the pair described their circles. Then in perfect unison, they tangented off to the North and glided down into the canyon of the South Fork. They did not come back. I have not seen a raven at the Garden since. Strange. There have always been ravens at the Garden.

When the raven pair had gone, a Gardener said, “I feel as though I have been in the presence of something.”

Another Gardener said, “This is a farewell.”

Another Gardener said, “It was like a ceremony.”

Another murmured, “They gave the dead one a funeral.”

I said, “We did the right thing. I think.” And, “What do we really know know about Ravens.”

Another Gardener said, “We know they belong here as much as we do,” and went on to wonder, “Will they come back?”

III. As if at a Symposium: Corvus Corax, the Common Raven

The Gardeners drank their coffee and tea and shared good things to eat. Dry, fall-tinted leaves drifted down. There was a lot to discuss and a lot of work to do to prepare the Garden for Winter. And for Spring, for that matter, and Summer. On and on. If the Raven was not in the sky, it was on Gardeners' minds. If there had been a lingering conversation like a symposium, a sharing of what we knew and felt or could find out about Raven, it might have gone something like this.

A Gardener who is a birder says: Well, the Raven is of the order corvidae. Our ravens are the common raven, corvus corax. They are scavengers, you know, roadkill and carrion, anything actually. You will see Raven picking around in the compost bins. Ravens are often mistaken for crows, but they larger, uniformly black, and are smarter, I guess you would say. Crows caw, ravens croak and mutter. They mate for life. The raven has a “Roman” nose and a kind of feather dewlap on its chest. In flight, its wings are level when it soars. Its tail has the shape of a spade. They can mimic human sounds. Where a crow flaps and flaps its wings, the raven glides and soars, often high on the thermals.

A Gardener whose interests include lore and legend says: Now, when Poe, “While I pondered weak and weary,” conjured the Raven to signify melancholy, “Quoth the Raven, ‘Nevermore.’”, didn’t he hit it bang on? Ravens are associated with death and bad news. The Raven pops up in many cultures...trickster, spirit, totem, emblem, bearer of omens and portents.

A Gardener who likes poetry speaks: I was trying to remember Frost, you know, “The way a crow/ Shook down on me...? OK, homage to Frost, then:

The way Raven

Called down to me

From out of sight

In the old pine tree

Gave my heart

A change of mood

And saved some part

Of a day I’d rued.

Another Gardener says: There is some interesting etymology and language usage here: corvidae, also corvus, is from Latin for “crow”. Corax, as in corvus corax is from Greek, “croaker”. Raven is from Old Norse, “hrafn”, meaning to clear one’s throat. Oh, and crow is from Anglo-Saxon, in imitation of its cry.

And you know how a groups of creatures have a collective name, like a covey of quail, flock of turkeys, congress of crows, exaltation of larks?

Sure, says another Gardener: there’s that gaggle of geese, a pilgrimage of pelicans, a skittering of killdeer...

Well, you might think it would be like, a judiciary of ravens, right? well, it is an unpleasantness of ravens.

The Gardener who likes poetry says, If I may, this occurs to me:

Raven soaring

Shadow in the sky

Shadow on the ground

Raven soaring by

Very there, without a sound.

A Gardener in touch with all that lives in the Garden observes: Makes you think of all things we humans share the Garden with, in the air above the ground, on the ground, under the ground. The other Gardeners join in:

Deer, racoon, rabbit and hare, skunk; say out!

Gopher, mole, vole, mouse, wood rat.

Gopher snake, garter snake. Anyone ever seen a rattlesnake? No?

Robin, jay, swallow, finch, quail...turkey!

Worms, millipedes, bacteria, fungi, nematodes.

Diabrotica, leaf flea beetles...

And us.

IV. Epilogue

A Gardener in touch with Native American cultures, arts and peoples heard the story. He telephoned a friend in New Mexico, a Hopi. His friend told him Raven is venerated in his culture, and many others, notably the Native American peoples of the Pacific Northwest. Yes, he said, the passing of Raven is an event and he would send the Gardener a fetish to commemorate the Raven’s passing. When it arrived, the Gardener took it to the grave and fixed it to the marker. It is two feathers, one a wing feather, the other a downy underfeather tied each to an end of foot-long string. When the air stirs, even slightly, the feathers move.

The Gardener who buried Raven appropriated one of the newly made blank signs used to tell what is planted in a bed and lettered “Old Raven” on it, and tapped it into the mound to mark the place.

A Gardener did what people do these days when they are curious: google search. There is a lot, a lot of information on ravens out there. The entry “raven” harvested 2,150,000 items.“Corvus corax” called up 18,300 items. “Corvus corax legend lore myth," elicited 17 items.

All that information, if it could be heaped together with some activating ingredients, might compost down to a residue of knowledge, and maybe even a bit of wisdom. Or, maybe wisdom would come by watching the raven, being in its space, hearing its cry.

Chester Case

The Sea Ranch, November, 2002