Gerenuk: A slender East African antelope with a long slim neck. It often stands erect on its hind legs leaning against the bush to browse on the higher branches.
Photozincograph: A print made by photozincography
Guardianess: A female guardian
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I sit silently, still as the sun amongst splashes of towering yellowing grass. Every breath is measured, calm and collected so as to not disturb the fragile cocoon I have crafted for myself. I am a new-born hatchling, sequestered away from the world; holed up in some explicitly personal bower, observing innumerable lives ebb past the shoreline of my vision.
Even the slightest move and her ear will twitch; her head will spasm up in shock, nostrils flaring. My target is born to pre-empt danger, to have already vanished by the time it unfurls. One last paranoid glance, left to right, then the Gerenuk pushes herself up, hoofs balancing on the bark of a nearby Acacia tree. It is a curious behaviour, unique and slightly jarring with one’s expectations of how a gazelle should act.
No wonder Waller was so taken by the creature. Its appearance is almost alien-like; the proportions all wrong. A tiny head balancing delicately atop a long, slender neck – just like a spinning plate on a stick. Legs clearly built for speed resemble little more than twigs, newly sprouted boughs, both remarkably limber and sprightly. Bat wing ears flicker amidst the upper branches of the tree. No wonder the Germans refer to it as the Giraffe Antelope.
The Gerenuk’s tongue emerges like a snail from its shell, cautiously exploring its surroundings; a thick, winding black slab of muscle, it wraps around the thorny leaves of the Acacia tree. Crushing them like a snake subduing prey, then expertly stripping every last leaf. Her eyes are always alert and moving, tiny nebulas rolling wildly in her head like a child’s marbles.
A twitch on my hand distracts me. A momentary glance betrays a thin trickle of red ants meandering across my skin, as if I am simply part of the environment. This is good. I have been accepted. They explore my shirt cuffs, pale and sandy, as if they are some new and exotic material they can squirrel away for use in their vast underground kingdom. A few curiously probe the wooden leg of my camera’s tripod, but the thick crust of varnish proves too tough a meal even for these voracious beasts.
I steady my hand, the glass plate already loaded in the camera. I made sure to wake at sunrise and soak it fully in the silver nitrate solution. Funny how a precious metal can capture the world in a tableau. This picture will be my crowning photozincograph. I will be the toast and envy of every collector back in London. No-one has captured the Gerenuk’s likeness before. At least, not yet.
A sudden rustle causes the Gerenuk to pause. I freeze. She slides back down onto all four feet. I hold my breath. From behind a tree a tiny copy of my subject stumbles ungainly forward – a perfect copy in miniature. My knuckles tense. Tenderly, I withdraw the dark slide and capture the picture: A child and its guardianess.
Stories On The Sofa 