Forest Raves Are a Severe Threat to Ecologies

Forest Raves Fuck Up The Forest

Forest raves fuck up the forest —

the doof doof annihilation

of the birds barely registered,

 

the minuscule syrinxes, the costumed

feathers, the hyperstimulated skin,

the padded nests you can collapse

 

into exhausted but still willing

to party on, tossing the fledglings

out on the forest floor to be stomped,

 

hands reaching to the canopy

& twilight’s nimbus — a false

friend of freedom, a flattering

 

admirer of the rubbished moon. And

the spreading of cinnamon fungus as you rave

to avoid limitations on venue numbers

 

due to Covid, the imitation of animals

that has no respect or understanding

for the animals imitated, a cultural

 

mocking, the melding with an ecology

which you destroy as effectively as farmers

& mountain bikers. You can doof to this doof.

 

You can crank up the energy consumption.

You can max out on the tools of capitalism.

You can carbonate in full immersion.

 

And so the fire twirlers in dry & heat-stricken

woodlands, & so the off-your-face open air

self-discovery & bonding rituals,

 

& so the mockery of all ancient knowledges,

& so the colonial paradoxes seem to be reset

with every alternative setting, each contra-

 

indication... & so the party at the end of the world

which is dance beats as utility as centres

in which you are the anonymous sole attraction,

 

the contradiction of liberation,

the raving exploitation of nature,

as your forest rave fucks up the forest

 

as you do the work for mining companies,

land developers, dispossessors and pastoralists,

as your forest rave fucks up the forest.

 

 

            John Kinsella