![\"09grizzly_650.JPG\"](\"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/assets_c\/2009\/04\/09grizzly_650-thumb-300x237-5747.jpg\")
<\/a><\/span>The New York Times had the story first<\/a>, with the SF Chronicle trailing<\/a>. It’s never good to trail a national paper on your local story. Those who think getting stomped on such a trivial matter doesn’t matter haven’t worked at a newspaper. A four-footed bronze animal blocking the entrance to the governor’s office qualifies as an event. The Chronicle should have had its paws all over it.<\/p>\nJon Carroll’s piece is nice, but I wish the paper had sent its art critic, Kenneth Baker<\/a>. Mr. Minimalism would not have been amused. When he rouses himself to lament, it is always worth reading.<\/p>\n Carroll the spoilsport mentioned the real problems real bears have in California. As metaphors and representations, however, they continue to thrive.<\/p>\n My favorite bear opens Theodore Roethke’s Four for Sir John Davies<\/i>, a passage titled The Dance<\/i><\/a>:<\/p>\n Is that dance slowing in the mind of man For the are all my friends: I saw one slide
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That made him think the universe could hum?
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The great wheel turns its axle when it can;
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I need a place to sing, and dancing-room,
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And I have made a promise to my ears
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I’ll sing and whistle romping with the bears.<\/p>\n
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Down a steep hillside on a cake of ice, —
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Or was that in a book? I think with pride:
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A caged bear rarely does the same thing twice
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In the same way: O watch his body sway!
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This animal remembering to be gay.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
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