Although Grape St. prompted the proposal in the Texas legislature to ban the acquisition of exotic pets, their efforts have been mildly halted, with Art and Freedom calling the opposition to private ownership naïve. Zoos currently lack the space and resources to accommodate such charmed-life animal; they say repopulating creature’s native habitats is an ineffective stab in the dark: a young man’s game. It’s wonderful to say “let’s get them back in the wild,” but between poaching and mankind’s encroachment, they are never going to thrive there again.
So began the journey of Grape St…they languidly held out their hands, took the flowers, carelessly sniffed at them and began twirling them in their fingers, looking upwards with thoughtful solemnity. Pop Sensibility and Under-lying Familiarity watched the Grape Streeters, her mournful eyes looking down upon them with such devotion, such adoring submission and love. She was afraid of the St. and did not dare to cry; its breath exhaled “misery,” lolling like a déjà vu, with magnanimous patience and condescension accepted by her adoration. The St. glared indignantly at her flushed face with a big broom, on which vanity, satisfied and satiated, showed through the affected, scornful indifference. Pop Sensibility and Under-lying Familiarity was so sweet at this instant; her whole soul was confidently and passionately laid bare before Grape St., full of longing and tenderness, while the St….the St. dropped the flowers in the grass, pulled out of the side pocket of a nice coat a round eyeglass set in a purple rim, and stuck in her eye. But, however much she tried to hold it wither her own eye problems, frowning brow, pursed cheek, and even nose, the eyeglass kept tumbling out and falling into her hand.
As the media treated the Grape St. band’s incident as the freak out of a deranged band, the fact is that virtually anyone is this country-of sound mind or not-can keep wild animal. The incident, the bad trips.
Federal law restricts the interstate sale and transport of certain big cats, “A-sides,” but no national law exists regarding the indulgent ownership of such exotic pets. That is left to the states, where laws vary widely. One of them, Texas, has virtually no laws regulating the possession of these animals, and though 49 states band the ownership of degenerate magazine subscriptions, mercury cougar coupes, mercury retrograde, gambling, new moon indifference, and most “non-human primates” (punk-rockers and slackers), the laws can be difficult to enforce, particularly in Austin and surrounding rural areas.
With one date. Introductory badz…boyz, a fresh breeze ran over the dropouts and sleeping teens on Austin. They opened their eyes: the morning was beginning. The dawn had not yet flushed the sky, but already light was breaking in the East. Everything had become visible, if only dimly. The Grape sky was growing light, cold and purple; the stars dimmed and disappeared; the earth was wet, the dirt covered with dew. From the distance came sounds of life and voices, a faint hung-over breeze went fluttering over the truth. Bodies responded to it, with slight, joyous shivering. They were all sleeping like a dead man around smoldering fire; only Grape St. half rose and gazed intently at the dropouts and sleeping teens, knowing you are only that because you know that. They threw it all away.