I see the field and trees and the summer air pierced by heavy sunlight through the rising dew that cooked the clouds so that they shriveled and sunk on top the hills in rings like tired halos. I see him be-feathered, sinews sweating slacking swinging against the rare winds that move through the grass up here. I see his feet and the dirt caught in the wrinkles of his soles as he kicks at the air and rakes his strong fingers against the space at his sides. He stops. His eyes are shadow-less and primal and I know they've never thought to look on me. His gaze is trained on something I cannot see way out there in the green sea. I know I have to go out there soon. That I'll have to pack my bag with bones and blood and birth myself into that forest. I know what he's looking at is a place for me he'll go to prepare out there in the deep green sea. He'll light a fire for me to follow when the night air turns blue and great-jawed things bite up at the moon.

And now that fire has been lit for hundreds of years, still burning. And I'm here sitting; writing with my bag of blood and bones.