The Invasion
By Amanda Anastasi
Belushya Guba on Novaya Zemlya, Russia, 2019
As though the kerb were the edge of sea ice,
it lifts one heavy, reluctant foot to the asphalt,
lumbers across the road with the combined grit
and desolation of a depleted predator, as cars swerve
and circle around it. Later in the afternoon, another is seen
lurking behind a block of flats. It peers into a window, fixated
on a woman cleaning fish. She slams the blind shut,
though the shadow of the animal’s jowl and saucepan-sized
paw is still visible. Another staggers over the mountain
of discarded bottles and cartridges at the local tip. It sniffs a car battery
and sinks its teeth into a chunk of Styrofoam. The next day, children are marked
late or absent from school and all who leave their homes move to and from
their vehicles with a ready vigilance. The stories are spreading of a bear wandering
into a doctor’s reception and the council hallway, undeterred by signals, dogs, patrol
cars or electric fences. Later, the townspeople make a circle around a third polar bear lying
on the pavement with a tranquiliser in its side. Arrangements are being made to airlift it back
to the Arctic where, again, it will not be able to stand at the edge of sea ice; will not catch a seal
for nourishment. It will stumble and wearily drag itself, then turn and head back to the village.
