Idaho Wilderness Hearings

Statement:

Mr. Fagerness. Salmo Sam I am. To speak as a caribou today would provide only a tirade of grunts and snorts. Pleasing, I trust, to my own kind but void, indeed, to human tongue running the risk of noncomprehension like the cry of the whale. To bridge this gap, I have looked to your poets for they are recognized by you for their ability to see from the hearts to the heart of such matters that are being considered today. 'Traveling through the dark,' by William Stafford: Traveling through the dark, I found a deer dead on the edge of Wilson River Road. It is usually best to roll them into the canyon. The road is narrow. To swerve might make more dead. By glow of the taillight, I stumble back of the car and stood by the heat. A doe. A recent killing. She had stiffened already almost cold. I dragged her off. She was large in the belly. My fingers touching her side brought me to reason her side was warm. Her fawn lay there waiting alive, still, never to be born. Beside that mountain road, I hesitated. The car aimed ahead at lowered parking lights under the hood purred the steady engine. I stood in the glare of the warm exhaust turning red. Around our group, I could hear the wilderness listen. I thought hard for all of us, my only swerving, and then pushed her over the edge into the river. The wilderness listens to you, Senator McClure. Think hard for us all. Decide for us all. We all know the inevitable result of a clash between a world of made and world of born. It is impossible to air for too much wilderness. For like the fawn, future generations wait. And they, too, will know from the record of our swerv Thank you.