Theurgy
There is a magic forest beyond the ice caves I am told. I believe it may have once been my home. Letters written but never sent. Words typed that never left.
I cut my arm to see if I would bleed. To know if I was still alive or if this was all just some imagining. But it was only cowardice that poured from me.
I am the girl who plays in mud. Amid the towering birds of paradise, snakes, spiders, and toads, I call my friends. The eleven wise cats that prowl the grounds. The giant old Saint Bernard skin horse that gives chase and lets me ride him around. The squishy summertime sweet plums I plucked in buckets from the tree and gave away like treasure chest candy.
My Alcatraz farm of ants, grasshoppers, and crickets I caught and tried in vain to keep. My lanky body that had yet to reveal the rolling hills ladyship would bequeath. Naked and bathed in sunlight, innocence, and delight. Zeitgeist.
I drink water from the hose and build a muddy swamp for the toads and me to sit our naked bums in its cooling reprieve. I splash around, trying to find more friends and talk for hours to all my critters and the ever-patient and watchful trees.
Grandma gives me a side-eyed sigh as she wonders aloud what kind of little girl is always up to such curious and dirty things. But I am undisturbed, content in the moment — happy, wild, and free.
