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He had travelled afar in search of food for his mate and children. While his home was just on the other side of the river, Scorpion could not swim, and a detour to the nearest passable bridge would add many moons to his trip.
So Scorpion sat, dreaming of home.
Frog, floating on her back in the river to take in the sun, was minding her own business, when she spied Scorpion on the shore.
She stuck out her tongue at him.
“What are you doing so far from the desert sands?” she asked, emboldened by the safe distance between them.
“Alas, my home lies on the other side of the river, but I have no way to cross.”
Frog grunted. “Too bad you can’t swim.”
Scorpion looked up, eyeing Frog closely. “But you can.”
“Clearly.” Frog did a somersault in the water to prove her point.
“You can take me across the water on your back,” Scorpion said.
Frog blinked. “Do I look like I have a death wish? One kiss of your stinger and I’m done for.”
Scorpion lowered his pinchers in a pleading gesture. “Why would I sting you while we’re crossing the river? We’d both drown.”
Treading water, Frog narrowed her eyes.
“Dear Frog, I promise not to harm you. One quick trip, then I’ll hop off your back and you’ll never see me again.”
“I know better than to trust a devil like you.”
Scorpion saw his chance for home slipping away. So he poured out the story of his mate and their hungry children, whom he had not seen in many moons.
Frog was touched by his words.
“You promise not to harm me?” she asked.
Scorpion nodded his head. “I swear on the lives of my children that I shall not harm you.”
Frog swam close to the shore, took a deep breath, and gestured for Scorpion to climb onto her back.
One leap and Scorpion landed. Frog struggled under his weight, but she was a strong swimmer. Slowly, she crawled across the water.
“Don’t even think about stinging me!” Frog said. “Or I’ll toss you to your death.”
Scorpion felt the flush of poison rushing to his tail. He thought how lovely it would be to sink his stinger into Frog’s smooth skin and watch her die.
“Ha. You’d be dead before you had the chance,” Scorpion spat.
As Frog and Scorpion wrestled with their thoughts, the water of the river held them, soothing them with its song, and their minds began to settle.
A new thought occurred to them both at once:
Who am I?
Frog had always known herself as a friendly amphibian who swam, napped, ate insects, and did all the other things frogs do.
Scorpion had been confident he was a hateful beast with a sting so deadly it was right that others should fear him.
But with the river flowing around them, Frog and Scorpion began to wonder if that’s really what they were at all.
A space opened in their minds. Frog and Scorpion felt themselves as the water, the air, the riverbank, themselves, the other, and everything in between.
Frog swam with an ease she’d never known before, and Scorpion relaxed his poisonous tail.
When they reached the opposite shore, Scorpion climbed off Frog’s back, leaving her unharmed, just as he had promised.
“I nearly stung you out there,” he admitted. “It would have been death for us both.”
“And I nearly threw you from my back,” said Frog. “That would have killed us just as surely.”
“Well, I’m glad we didn’t.”
“Me, too.”
Frog watched Scorpion recede into the distance and laughed.
Whoever would have thought a frog and a scorpion could be kind to each other?
Frog remembered the feeling of herself as all that was, and for a moment, she understood. When there is no self or other, kindness is all that remains.
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