{"id":7175,"date":"2024-04-14T14:22:25","date_gmt":"2024-04-14T18:22:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/parmaks.com\/Resources\/an-illustrated-celebration-of-the-genius-and-wonder-of-animal-dwellings-the-marginalian\/"},"modified":"2024-04-14T14:22:25","modified_gmt":"2024-04-14T18:22:25","slug":"an-illustrated-celebration-of-the-genius-and-wonder-of-animal-dwellings-the-marginalian","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/parmaks.com\/Resources\/an-illustrated-celebration-of-the-genius-and-wonder-of-animal-dwellings-the-marginalian\/","title":{"rendered":"An Illustrated Celebration of the Genius and Wonder of Animal Dwellings \u2013 The Marginalian"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Profit<\/a>
\n<\/p>\n

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\"Home:<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s no place like home,\u201d Dorothy sighs in The Wizard of Oz<\/em>. But home is not a place \u2014 it is a locus of longing, always haunted by our existential homelessness. \u201cWelcome home!\u201d a cheaply suited broker once exclaimed at me, swinging open the door to a tiny studio as my foot fell on the beige wall-to-wall carpet and my eyes on the two dead roaches embracing in the corner. Between the time I left my family home in Bulgaria in my late teens and the time I settled in Brooklyn in my late twenties, I moved in and out of housing across continents and oceans, cycling through dozens of dwellings. No matter how many books I shelved and how many plants I potted, none ever felt like a home. That took another decade \u2014 not because of anything in the house, but because I had finally begun feeling at home in myself. <\/p>\n

Other animals don\u2019t anguish with such existential troubles. \u201cThey are so placid and self-contain\u2019d,\u201d Whitman wrote. \u201cThey do not sweat and whine about their condition. They do not lie awake in the dark and weep for their sins\u2026 Not one is dissatisfied, not one is demented with the mania of owning things.\u201d From the moment they are born until the moment they die, other animals are entirely at home in their being, for they don\u2019t suffer the tyranny of a self, with all its restless need for expression and actualization. The homes they build \u2014 strange and various, baffling and beautiful in their singularity \u2014 reflect that purity of being. No ego and no self-image govern the design \u2014 only the exquisite genius of evolution, refining the blueprint over eons to make each home a perfect temple for consecrating each creature\u2019s biological destiny. <\/p>\n

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The wonder, perfection, and diversity of animal dwellings come alive in artist Isabelle Simler\u2019s book Home<\/em><\/strong><\/a> (public library<\/em><\/a>) \u2014 a vibrant catalogue of nature\u2019s creativity: the miraculous courtship cathedral<\/a> of the satin bowerbird (Ptilonorhynchus violaceus<\/em>), the \u201clace citadel\u201d of the cross orbweaver spider (Araneus diadematus<\/em>), the \u201csilky apartment\u201d of the comet moth (Argema mittrei<\/em>), the \u201cmossy miniature home\u201d of the hummingbird (Trochilidae<\/em>), the \u201ccactus cabin\u201d of the world\u2019s smallest owl, the elf owl (Micrathene whitneyi<\/em>), smaller than a sparrow. <\/p>\n

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There is emergence incarnate<\/a> in the termite cathedral, built by millions of blind insects with no leader and no blueprint. There is an affirmation of poet and potter M.C. Potter\u2019s credo that \u201cthe creative spirit creates with whatever materials are present\u201d<\/a> in the case-making caddisfly, housing its larvae in snug cases made of whatever is on hand: bits of wood, grains of sand, shells and pebbles and marine debris stitched together with silk. There is the sheer astonishment of the baya weaver\u2019s nest, meticulously woven from fresh grasses that change color under the sun\u2019s rays. <\/p>\n

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Nearly a century after Rachel Carson pioneered the then-radical approach of writing about the natural world from the living perspective of each creature, Simler channels each animals\u2019s approach to its home in a short singsong first-person poem.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\n

GRASSY LODGE
of the Eurasian harvest mouse<\/strong>
Micromys minutus<\/em><\/p>\n

My tail knows each blade of grass
and tethers me safely
as I swing through the air,
a micro-acrobat
dressed in soft skin.
My tangled nest,
woven from grasses,
is shaped like a little ball.
Stem to stalk, stalk to stem,
a bounce or two,
and in between
I rest in my house.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\n

PAPIER-M\u00c2CH\u00c9 HOTEL
of the common wasp<\/strong>
Vespula vulgaris<\/em><\/p>\n

I nibble the dry bark,
and with my saliva I mush the wood fibers together.
That\u2019s how I make the paper pulp
that I\u2019ll use to build my palace.
The shades of color vary
depending on the tree
I\u2019ve been chewing.
Inside, everything is well organized.
The hexagonal cells are
neatly spread out,
arranged in circular tiers
held by cardboard pillars.
The lightweight nest
is shrouded
in layers of paper,
and so it remains
at the ideal
temperature.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\n

HAUTE COUTURE BEDCHAMBER
of the common tailorbird<\/strong>
Orthotomus sutorius<\/em><\/p>\n

With three mango leaves
and the tip of my sharp beak,
I fashion my tailor-made house
at the edge of the forest.
Carrying a blade of grass or thread from a web,
I jab, I sew, I flit here and there.
Stitching straight lines or zigzags,
I hem, I make knots, I chirp and cheep.
Finally, I pad out my home with woolly red fibers,
animal hair, and another chirrup or two.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

What emerges is a dazzling testament to naturalist Sy Montgomery\u2019s poetic observation that \u201cour world, and the worlds around and within it, is aflame with shades of brilliance we cannot fathom \u2014 and is far more vibrant, far more holy, than we could ever imagine.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Complement Home<\/em><\/strong><\/a> with The Blue Hour<\/em><\/a> \u2014 Simler\u2019s breathtaking celebration of nature\u2019s rarest color \u2014 then revisit the sapiens counterpart to these creaturely dwellings in Carson Ellis\u2019s tender illustrated catalogue of the many kinds of human homes<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Profit<\/a>
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cThere\u2019s no place like home,\u201d Dorothy sighs in The Wizard of Oz. But home is not a place \u2014 it is a locus of longing, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7176,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7175","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-purpose"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/parmaks.com\/Resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7175","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/parmaks.com\/Resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/parmaks.com\/Resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/parmaks.com\/Resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/parmaks.com\/Resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7175"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/parmaks.com\/Resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7175\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/parmaks.com\/Resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7176"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/parmaks.com\/Resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7175"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/parmaks.com\/Resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7175"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/parmaks.com\/Resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7175"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}