Zootrophy. (ˈzəʊəˌtrɒfɪ). n. (Zoology) the nourishment of animals

"A premonition of extinction. The warmth of nostalgia. The loss of coherence. Melancholic memory. Fugue."

-David Edwards

As a child, outings to the Johannesburg Zoo were laced with regret. I was sad for the animals gawked at in the name of education, in  particular the Artiodactyla ( fancy word for a goat) from across the great plate tectonic divide stumbling over granite domes and a polar bear in a polyurethane pentagon, immolated in the African summer heat. There the white bear stayed, the zoo website states, for 30 years, before being put down because of "liver and heart and failure." Any child will tell you that an animal taken 11186 kilometres from their home sooner or later was going to die of a broken heart.  I went back to the Zoo in 2021 with entropy and an Alice in Wonderland theme in my head . Crouching  in an entrance  tunnel for a photograph of palm trees, a child ran past and jogged my camera, my careful composition suddenly a jagged mess. Like the laying down of memory, I thought, how unreliable the recording of light is, perfectly aligned rays sent into orbit at the slightest bump. The  theme expanded as I walked down paths flanked by disappearing herds to the tune of Camptown Races- a general sense of the world derailed by our own greed with future generations paying the price and having to go along for the wild, wild ride.  At the exit I tripped on erupting pavement (it's a Johannesburg thing - colonialists dropped seeds from their own lands that have turned into Triffids which have broken free of their sidewalk bunkers, bursting through storm water drains and strangling sewage systems to the dismay of anyone on foot.  The Future is Leaving I thought as I  left the Johannesburg Zoo. Can't we generally do better for the environment? Can't we do better for animals? Can't we do better for children?

(The triffid is a fictional tall, mobile, carnivorous plant species, created by John Wyndham in his 1951 novel The Day of the Triffids. The word "triffid" has become a common reference in British English to describe large, invasive or menacing-looking plants.) 

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These are large thumbnails, captions on individual photographs.