Girl of the Earth

I love the smell of soil and rain-wet leaves. I love burying my feet in the sand as if I am growing from the earth myself. My hands raised, I am a woman-tree; through the bottoms of my feet I absorb what is good from the land and even when I step away I feel I am nature’s cousin. I am, after all, made by God from the dust of this planet; I am, I often feel, a Girl of the Earth.

I am Girl of the Earth and I never cease to wonder at the clay from which I was made; the atmosphere through which my being came forth. All around me is its majesty and I am proud to be related in some way to this planet; to share the same Creator. The ocean is black and it merges seamlessly with the night sky, stars and sea occupying the same dark space, as if the earth ends here. Waves groan, swelling white-crested from the darkness, groping desperately at the shore. With joined hands we stand at the edge where the waves can break against our feet, foamy fingers wrapping around our ankles. We stare out into the roaring abyss, watching lightning in the distance. Here at the edge of the world he kisses me, long and deep, as we seem to drown in wave-roars and cool, salty night air. I am one flesh with him and together we are siblings with creation and children of God and nothing could be more wondrous or mysterious than this. Even my dreams are neither as strange nor as beautiful as this reality. It rises slowly, swelling, pulsing, then explodes in a fray of sparkle and light. I am Girl of the Earth and my tectonic plates move and shift in time with it, over and under and around each other, creating and filling spaces within me so that I too pulse its rhythm.
Even as I sleep it beats.

I am Girl of the Earth and I’ve lived a thousand years in the night. I can feel the dreams in my bones still. I lie on my back amidst the blankets, arms stretched out and ankles crossed, crucified to the morning.

I dreamed that when we die we all become one disembodied entity, all consciousnesses mixing and intermingling with one another, a melting together of souls. Feeling, celebrating, and mourning together; knowing and wondering as one. In my dream, lonely people wanted to die and join the communion of souls. And when I woke I wondered if they would be quite so lonely if they realized that they too were part of this grand, fantastical reality. That they also are of the earth, of each other, and of God.

I am Girl of the Earth and I will never want for magic.


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