Frog Talk Seriously, Rick Bartow, 2015
“When a difficult time is upon us, our joy must fill the air.”
– Rabbi Nachman of Breslov
Blessed are these elder peeps who spring us from chilly forecasts. Praise be their green primordial songs.
Science claims the artists commonly known as “chorus frogs” began composing around 200 million years ago. These seemingly meek musicians inspired thundering crowds, long before mammon’s apes marched onto Turtle Island. They’ve been Turtle’s friends since the beginning, leaps earlier than wampum or blood quantum.
As an Appalachian child I was serenaded by the tribe that biologists called Pseudacris crucifer. Spring peepers. They’re a climby treble-tone choir from the Hylidae line, distant cousins to those Ranidae croakers. Their revivals coaxed me out to creeks and ponds where I’d unwind from city liturgies. Echoes of bullies vanished with sublime aquatic plops and blobs.
Pseudacris crucifer – spring peeper
I embraced the faith of tadpoles in God’s ecotonal space. There I could believe life would always grow back, no matter how much fat we humans snatched, regardless of the innocence we stole. Abundance would return, sure as Easter.
Nature invited me into her jubilant muck, and dang if I didn’t respond with the anthropoid urges of a trained American boy. What could I make from those moments to advance my social standing in the everyday world? Colonial haints possessed me with dueling choices.
My left hand hankered to catch and keep these beauties in a covered wash tub behind our garage. Over time more captives would accrue. My zoo would become a cool tourist destination.
Yet I also wanted to be part of a big gigging expedition. Our right-fisted crew of mighty hunters would secure the booty. Then grateful friends would gather round a communion of yummy fried conquest. Fun lore: frog flesh first became popular in medieval times, during Lent, when sacrificers reckoned it didn’t count as meat.
The soundtrack to both these mini-bro dreams featured my banjo solos. There were humbling lessons, of course. For example, that scare-the-chick schtick did not work as advertised on television. Turned out most girls I knew were far less afraid of frogs than I was of having a real girlfriend.
Yet my first reciprocal crush was in fact blessed by frogs, at church camp in North Carolina. After a week of fatuous courting goaded by other larval Christians, she and I were finally alone. How did we use those precious minutes to consummate our rainbow connection? We looked for frogs near the parking lot where our parents were picking us up.
I found one and put him in her hand, or maybe it was the other way around. We returned to our homes in separate Tennessee towns, exchanged a few letters. Fifty-odd years later we remet on Facebook. She’s an awesome songwriter now, and also posts videos on how to enjoy the company of animals without making them into pets or grub.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dqYvD6oSdsM
Other music exists, yep. She and I helped circulate this truth through the halls of our hillbilly grammar schools. Back in 1971, a seismic shift occurred when a long-haired rocker belted out four freaky words that we chanted over and over with our classmates.
“Jeremiah was a bullfrog,” proclaimed Chuck, lead vocalist for Three Dog Night. This declaration transcended the left-right binary of social engagement. It encouraged kids of all ages to jump off the banks of duality into a silly swimming hole of joy.
The four words surely revved up boomers. Four years younger than Chuck, Cher sang them in a duet with Sonny. Donald surely smiled at the tune in New York City as he grabbed the reins of dad’s real estate empire. At NYU Oliver nodded with approval while screening his first biographical film, “Last Year in Viet Nam.” Bibi may have grinned while training with elite military forces.
Gens X, Y, and Z would hear those words too, linking us all back to the frolics of 1971. That year Rubio and Elon surfed the amniotic waves out into migrant Miami and South Africa’s bright white sun. The yet-to-be-born JD was just a lick in the schwing of heaven’s hedge fund. Olaf had just directed a Swedish TV drama, four decades before the rainfrog Pristimantis gretathunbergae was named after his activist granddaughter.
Three Dog Night’s hit delighted many folks who heard it. And apparently those opening words just hopped out of Chuck’s mouth. He felt his seven bandmates needed a silly song to bring them together as a team. Thus a prophet became a bullfrog, and “Joy to the World” was recorded with all the boys singing in harmony.
This reminds me of something a hillbilly wise-woman said. She told me the meaning of the word “silly” is rooted in the word “holy.” Deep medicine can emerge if we stop separating reality into boxes, think how things are related.
And lo, there is connectivity in the idea that a frog family would name their offspring after a Hebrew prophet. Adherents of Judaism abstain from eating amphibians. So do Muslims, though apparently there’s some debate within Islam as to whether Jeremiah was an actual prophet or just a prominent religious figure.
Either way, the name is strangely chosen for the song because it doesn’t summon up feelings of joy. Some Christian scholars refer to Jeremiah as “the weeping prophet.” He was handed the thankless task of rebuking Judean leaders for their behavior.
Rulers of all stripes scorn criticism, regardless of source or intent. In keeping with that script, Jeremiah endured accusations, assaults, imprisonment, and attempts on his life. If this grieving Jewish hero were speaking out today, he would be branded as a self-loathing enemy of the Jewish state. Authorities famously tossed him in a well where he would have perished if sympathizers hadn’t intervened. Word has it he was ultimately stoned to death by other believers.
If I could time-travel to pivotal moments in songwriting history, I would respectfully suggest an alternate four-syllable name that would add some holy emphasis to Chuck’s silliness.
Zechariah would make a great name for a frog. It means “God remembers,” which is true for all creatures, even those who write. From what I’ve read, three key Biblical figures who bore that name carry combined medicine that would be very meaningful in terms of frog-human interactions and humanity’s relationship with creation in general.
The first Zechariah was a Hebrew priest. Like Jeremiah, he was called by God to rebuke his leaders and was killed as a result. He’s not considered a prophet by anyone, but he played an important spiritual role. Judean rulers murdered him near the temple altar during Shabbat, reportedly on the Day of Atonement. To preserve their dominion, authorities sacrificed him on their most sacred day of the year.
The second Zech, a Jewish prophet, fared better than his predecessor. The Old Testament book that bears his name was carefully transcribed. Zech’s admonishments to Hebrew political authorities were not so harsh as to invoke brute violence. Instead, he delivered messages by way of cautionary dream visions and poetic imagery. I really want to believe Zech experienced ample moments of joy amid his life of very strange writing. He’d make a great namesake for a hippie frog family, because his words are profoundly trippy to this day.
And then there’s the New Testament priest, Z #3, whom Muslims recognize as a prophet and Christians just plain dig. In addition to being John the Baptist’s dad – by way of his wife Elizabeth’s miraculous postmenopausal pregnancy – Islam teaches that Zechariah was asked by God to protect his cousin Mary, mother of Jesus thanks to immaculate conception. This makes sense, because both Z and Mary knew what it was like to be visited by an angel with magical birth-news.
From an Islamo-Christian perspective, Z and his Jewish family played a key role in humanity’s spiritual journey. Their intersecting story got gravely interesting when I read about Z’s death. According to one source, Z was killed for refusing to remove Mary from the temple area reserved for virgins. Another says he was slaughtered in that sacred space when Judean military forces came to kill Z’s infant son (part of Herod Sr’s order to sacrifice all male children of a certain age who were born in the vicinity of Bethlehem).
Other gruesome accounts seem equally incompatible. Yet for me these stories point to a common pattern with power, when change agents are tyrannized and killed to preserve the status quo. Their deaths are directed by top-down command, or they’re conducted in a more horizontal fashion, through the actions of rank-and-file peers. These methods tend to work hand in hand. Often they involve the enforcement of religious dogma, social segregation, and economic hierarchies.
It’s easy to get distracted from this common dynamic, instead focus on conflicts in narrative. Also accounts of state-authorized bloodshed get blurred by institutions that publish them and were complicit in that sacrifice. The search for wisdom is further confused when fealty to powerful public figures trumps our devotion to the well-being of everyday folks who live in community.
Simple joys remind us of love’s deep through-line. Z and Elizabeth surely experienced this common thread at family gatherings. Scripture tells us of one moment, when John leaped inside Elizabeth’s womb, upon hearing Mary greet his mom. My wife Jennifer, a seasoned birth-worker, says this is a beautiful phenomenon that happens regularly.
Some folks hoist John and Jesus up on towering pedestals, yet this distances them from us. Surely they played together when they were growing up and had time to enjoy being boys. I imagine them exploring the countryside, marveling at critters, singing silly songs. Did these beloved Jewish cousins call up joyful childhood memories as they awaited death at the hands of Judeo-Roman authorities? Were flashbacks of tender friendship clear and strong?
I need to believe, so my heart might summon something fit to read beyond the end-times. Words come slow as rulers flex their executive muscles, and humanity’s sacrifice grips the planet tight.
Politicians made Jesus into an all-mighty mascot. Their ceremonial cooks turned his desecrated body into a happy meal, his blood a restorative juice dispensed at franchised altars across the empire. The emperor broadcast four words to accompany this feast along with a cruciform emblem for his servants in uniform.
“In hoc signo vinces.” By this sign, conquer!
The historical context of Constantine’s purportedly divine dream is as geeky as it is grave, and so it is rarely considered by believers. Basically, Constantine used a mark signifying the crucifixion of Jesus as talismanic cover, specifically to advance the success of his military forces and thereby extend his power. Before that point, many Christians were put to death for refusing to venerate earthly authorities and serve in their military.
Commandos stamped with this sign were no less susceptible to ravenous pursuits than those who followed Herod’s orders, like people of any stripe. Yet the emblem provided a potent sense of moral protection for those tasked with the cruel work of subjugation. They could do their job with righteous confidence and the assurance of forgiveness.
Brands can disseminate mindsets. In this case, the empire’s violent execution of a superstar rabbi was later used by that empire to sanctify more violence. In subsequent years it was used as a psychological prop to scapegoat and slaughter Jewish families in general. And the abomination has since been used as cover for more desolation. Some who order and execute the destruction of hospitals and schools filled with starving innocent families use it as a shield, similar to the way others have abused crucifixes. Any who oppose this abuse face shame and ostracism for allegedly dishonoring the sacrificial bloodshed of previous victims.
Tyrants never forget how violence can be consecrated to serve their amassment of power. Professed Christian leaders have greased the wheels of empire, in ways that mirror those who’ve claimed to uphold other religions. Power-mongers have used many rites and traditions to assert their divine ordination, vowing to control the check-points that separate evil and righteousness.
No one is above the rule of lovingkindness. Yet again and again, power tempts us to trade this golden measure for gilt packaging. People are people, as they say.
So are frogs, according to some folks, though the meaning is different. Cultures native to Turtle Island consider frogs to be among the “first people.” This is a way of acknowledging humanity’s elder relatives who’ve long peopled the earth and still thrive despite our depredations.
Deep joy wriggles inside me when I hear the chorus of spring. Love swims up through the bubbles of our soul-dipped DNA. Creation kens this call of freedom, beckons our return to connectivity.
Did a prophet sing of homecoming, on a creek in the heart of Eden? I can only imagine, and smile while wading through grief.
Yet God remembers everything.
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