The Carriage Horse controversy in New York is filled with irony and illusion. There is this idea, seriously advanced by the city’s mayor, that vintage cars that cost $160,000 apiece and and run on electric power, are more “eco-friendly” than horses, which cost about $2,000 apiece and require only grass and hay and water.

They call the vintage cars “cruelty-free,” yet the campaign to bring them to New York is rife with cruelty and rage.

They claim that the horses are not suited any longer for Central Park, but they don’t seem to know that the park was designed for them by Frederick Law Olmstead, who criss-crossed his beautiful park with bridges and trails for the carriage horses to ride easily on.

Almost magically, the horses weave in and out of the landscape of New York’s Central Park, they are as natural to it as trees and shrubs and flowers.

When I think of the carriage horses, I always think of the children, and when I take a photo like this I think this is something that the children of New York and the many visitors and the lovers and newlyweds and wide-eyed visitors will never see again, if the horses are banned.

What value do we place on magic in the world? And history? And on our own individual connection to Mother Earth? The horses are calling to us, pleading with us to wake up and see what we are doing and recognize what is ancient and important in our world. They are in danger of extinction by the hollow men and women, the legions of the angry and the soulless.