The Old Wolf

The old wolf sat still in the coldness of the darkening night. His stomach made the only sound that came from him, as it rumbled its desire to be filled. He had lost his place as leader of the pack and his pride would no longer allow him to run with the pack. Without the pack he could only hunt small game, and it had been a few days since he had been able to catch even a mouse, so his stomach growled its displeasure at being so poorly served.

His attention was on a small hole in the ground, he could smell the rabbits inside from where he sat, down wind from the burrow. He knew that in a place there was rabbit burrows that they would be young bucks that had been forced out of the burrow but not yet taken a doe. Because it is the doe who digs the burrow and made the home they would be around, and sleeping above ground. He just had to catch a scent, so he patently sat, grocery shopping.

He crouched down and did not move from his stillness, until dawn was breaking, when he saw a young buck come out of the bushes and started to graze. Resisting the urge his stomach gave him he remained where he was. Then determining that the rabbit was moving from him at an angle, but still down wind he rose from his crouch and started a slow stalk. His belly just barely above ground, he crept in the rabbit’s direction, freezing in place every time the rabbit change what it was doing. Though the rabbit had no hole of its own yet, it was not above diving into another’s home to get to safety, so the old wolf sneaked in the fog of early morning, ever decreasing the distance between him and the rabbit. Change his position to keep down wind, for the rabbit could smell almost as good as the wolf and see as good as he could.

Then, like a coiled spring unleashing he sprung cutting more then five feet off of the twenty foot or so that had separated him from his breakfast with his lunge. Like a flash the rabbit was off and running like death itself was after him, and it was. The rabbit at first just tried to put distances between him and the wolf, but with every bound that the old wolf took he came a few feet closer to the rabbit. The rabbit dodged to the left then to the right but the old wolf would not be shaken. He was not hunting with his nose now, but with his eyes, and with every change of direction the rabbit made the old wolf cut down his lead. The rabbit had spied a burrow and made his final change of direction to late.

Just as the old wolf was about to seize the rabbit it froze, paralyzed in its fear it went into a trance and did not even feel the old wolf’s teeth as they bit the life out of him. The rabbit’s life went to the old wolf whose live was maintained for another day thanks to the rabbit’s loss. The old wolf waked away leaving only a few puff of hair to show where he had ate breakfast.

As he went in search of a place to lay his head and sleep while his stomach reveled in its job when two dogs that live on the farm which the old wolf had just dined. The dogs were in great contrast to the old wolf, sleek and well fed while the old wolf was gaunt and ragged. The dogs took pity on the old wolf and told him that he could come live with them. “You mean join your pack the wolf asked?”

“No”’ one of the dogs answered, “we are not a pack. We live with the man in that building over there.”

“He is a good man“, the other dog said, “He feed us well, seldom disciples us, and gets us better if we get sick.”

“What are those things around your neck?” asked the old wolf.
“Oh“, one said, “These are our collars.”

“What are they for?”

“Our master uses them to put our tags on, to put a leash on us if he wants to walk us, and if he goes away he sometime chains us up so we wont run away while he is gone.”

“Oh, I see” said the wolf, “You are not free to come and go as you will?”

“Oh no” they both chimed in,“ we belong to the man.”

“Then I must decline your so gracious offer,” said the wolf with the sarcasm dripping from his mouth. “I will never give up my freedom for a full belly!”

With that the old wolf turned tail and broke into a dead run, all though of a nap were forgotten as he raced across the ground exulting in his freedom.

Freedoms can only exist with in the frameworks of the bounders and limits of the domain. A fish never knows the freedom of the sky, and a scoring eagle cannot escape into space. The wolf can only be free within his constrains but he insists upon being a wolf, you will never find a trained wolf act, for they will just not be trained. Man now, well man is another thing. ..
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Rexx