Thor Sørheim: 'Dyrenes ark'

 

THE ANIMALS’ ARK

 

The animals’ own ark sank because the water became polluted,

and thereby whole species of animals died out thousands of years ago.

Mammoths and prehistoric lions, giant vultures

and the mythical sabre-toothed tiger. Nor should we

forget the dire wolf. Not to mention the largest

of all birds we have heard of, the Teratorn, which weighed as much

as a full-grown man. This is a story

of creation and extinction that cannot be rounded off by a dove

with an oily leaf in its beak. The animals drowned in a pool of oil

and were transmuted into an image of themselves, fossils, which

were later found on the sea-bed, and the message they convey

to us today we must write down in our own scriptures.