....We Are Billion Year Old Carbon

Yesterday evening it took us two hours to travel 20km to get home from work.
The roads of Joburg were gridlocked by dint of some moron sending out an email warning of a tornado in Gauteng.
The financial hub of this country came to a standstill as people fled to their homes in panic.
How easy it would be to cripple this city-we nearly managed it yesterday.

This morning we have woken to news of an iceberg off the coast of the country.

Take that, global warming denialists.

But this is all beside the point. This is what I really wanted to say:
(Thank you, Joni Mitchell)

Well, I came upon a child of God
He was walking along the road
And I asked him, 'Tell where are you going?'
This he told me
Said, 'I'm going down to Yasgur's Farm,
Gonna join in a rock and roll band.
Got to get back to the land and set my soul free.'

We are stardust, we are golden,
We are billion year old carbon,
And we got to get ourselves back to the garden.

'Well, then can I walk beside you?
I have come to lose the smog,
And I feel like I'm a cog in something turning.
And maybe it's the time of year,
Yes and maybe it's the time of man.
And I don't know who I am,
But life is for learning.'

We are stardust, we are golden,
We are billion year old carbon.
And we got to get ourselves back to the garden.

By the time we got to Woodstock,
We were half a million strong
And everywhere was a song and a celebration.
And I dreamed I saw the bomber death planes
Riding shotgun in the sky,
Turning into butterflies
Above our nation.

We are stardust, we are golden,
We are caught in the devil's bargain,
And we got to get ourselves back to the garden.

Image: Zoar, from 'Clouds Without Water'


PS: Newsflash! I heart Desmond Tutu!


"We've conveniently forgotten that Christians burnt witches at the stake. It wasn't pagans responsible for the Nazi genocide - it was Christians," Tutu said.