I'm sure there's a god in favor of drums.  Consider their pervasiveness---the thump, thump and slide of waves on a stretched hide of beach,
the rising beat and slap of their crests against shore baffles,
the rapping of otters cracking molluscs with stones,
woodpeckers beak-banging, the beaver's whack of his tail-paddle,
the ape playing the bam of his own chest,
the million tickering rolls of rain off the flat-leaves and razor-rims of the forest.

And we know the noise of our own inventions---snare and kettle,
bongo, conga, big bass, toy tin, timbals, tambourine, tom-tom.

But the heart must be the most pervasive drum of all.
Imagine hearing all together every tinny snare of every heartbeat
in every jumping mouse and harvest mouse, sagebrush vole and
least shrew living across the prairie;
and add to that cacophony the individual staccato tickings inside
all gnatcatchers, kingbirds, kestrels, rock doves,
pine warblers crossing, criss-crossing each other in the sky,
the sound of their beatings overlapping with the singular
hammerings of the hearts of cougar, coyote, weasel, badger,
pronghorn, the ponderous bass of the black bear;
and on deserts too, all the knackings, the flutterings inside
wart snakes, whiptails, racers and sidewinders, earless lizards,
cactus owls;
plus the clamors undersea, slow booming in the breasts of beluga
and bowhead, uniform rappings in a passing school of cod or
bib, the thidderings of bat rays and needlefish.

Imagine the earth carrying this continuous din,
this multifarious festival of pulsing thuds, stutters and
drummings, wheeling on and on across the universe.

This must be proof of a power existing somewhere
definitely in favor of such a racket.

Copyright @1999 Pattiann Rogers