A Thousand Tears Flowing

Be thankful for it.

Worship it.

On it goes, without a care in the world. Swirling and pushing through the earth itself, reflecting life and enchanting all around it. Unforgiving and endless it surpasses even my own lifetime breaking anything in its path. It is clever, though, for it is gentle in its breaking and its subtlety often goes unnoticed. It treks the mountains and grassy plains, winding around the landscape like a snake, yet in all its movement I sense it does not really move at all. For its heart does not beat like ours and it is not born with the burden of a guaranteed expiration. It is immortal and painstakingly stubborn. It is a thing of ethereal beauty but that is just the surface and its surface is known to mirror and mimic the greatest of lies.

I was told stories about its mysterious allure from a young age. Many would say its ability to give life was balanced with the capacity to take life. How cruel it must be to showcase such perfection only to snatch the vulnerable and consume them in a most monstrous way. My people have suffered greatly because of it, but we have also survived because of it. It contains the essence of life itself and we cannot hope to live without out it. Such a desperate contract to which our lives are signed and forfeited.

Like us, many creatures were attracted to it. Some were too fearsome to defeat and wreaked havoc on our land, some brought disease and plagued our people and food, some decided to be extra cunning and live within it; punishing our people whenever we wandered too close. How I wish it could be ours again, but not out of love and desire – out of need. Its unpredictable wrath alone is enough without having to compete against animals. It is hard to believe something so beautiful and pure and life-sustaining could be so oblivious to our needs. Harder yet it is to believe that something we rely on for our own livelihood could be utterly terrible and merciless. Such is the way with things that are blindly venerated.

Here I was, upon its magnificence tainting its glorious surface with a barely defendable vessel. I floated across worlds with its deceitful mirror beneath me. I knew its bright reflection of the world above was an attempt to win me over, but I was not so easily swayed. I knew what it was truly capable of and how it lacked a heart and the capacity to care. My parents had instructed me to never journey it alone but I needed closure. We all did. I had to be alone to hear its answers properly, to decipher the whispers of its gentle force and make meaning of its incomprehensible ways. I had to speak with it alone to truly understand why it stole my sister and spat her back out void of soul and spirit. Why it decided to take someone so young and delicate and innocent of the horrors of mortality and cut her life so ruthlessly short. I needed to know why my people continued to worship it blindly without holding it accountable for its crimes and deceit. Why my family was expected to forgive it and understand it. Why everyone else was able to just blatantly move on with their lives and seemingly forget what it had done to my sister. I couldn’t go on without the answers and so I found myself upon it, basking in its false glory. As I came to the centre, I plummeted a wooden spear deep into its heart and forced it into the bones of its body. It crunched into the depths of its core, anchoring me down. My eyes narrowed on the ever folding and flowing surface of its skin, “Why? Why did you do it?”

It carried on as though I was nothing more than a minuscule, pestering animal. It did not bleed or cry. It was immune to my dismal efforts. I did not even exist before it; my pain was as invalid as my questions. I took the deepest breath I ever had and allowed my lungs to fill completely before screaming, “Why her?”

Tear flushed through my eyes as I pictured her swollen body washed up against the bank. The pain in my parents’ eyes when we finally found her. The shock that emanated through our people as her tragic death became apparent. The tearing of my own heart seeing her face distorted by the violent drowning and collision against the rocks. I pinched my eyes closed tight but the image was just as clear and horrifying as the first time. My heart pounded with anger and despair.

“Why?” I yelled again. My cries were insignificant to this particular god. There was no hope in conversing. It cared not for my pain or my suffering. It cared for nothing but itself. My body dropped back down into my vessel. I only wondered why my people continued to worship it when its gifts were never intentionally bestowed. Any benefit we had ever received from it was a side effect of its ignorance and arrogance. My people were stupid enough to see it as a miracle, to think that they had personally been chosen to receive good fortune. And their excuse when their deity was not so kind? It works in mysterious ways. Mysterious? Is that all my sister’s death is. Is that all her life was worth? Was she just a part of this twisted entity’s mysterious way of being? No. This thing should not be worshipped. We cannot be thankful for the torturous, horrifying and violent drowning of a six-year-old girl. We cannot praise such a thing. My hand tightened around my spear almost forcing splinters into my skin. My pain was enduring and fiery and spiteful and vengeful and it would outlast this wretched god. I would never be thankful for it. I would never worship it.