Dear God,

Must I suffer? Must I die for You? I go into the tunnel and this is where you bring me? To this place of horror and pain? Where has the garden gone? But, I see that you have suffered too. And yet, you live. Your flesh is burnt. You are not recognizable. What is this grisly countenance, burnt and desiccated flesh, blackened bones? And yet, you carry the crown of thorns so that I might know you still. Why are you restless? Why do you stir and rustle? What is this dark chamber with its blackened walls and seething stone? Have I died here? Did this thing happen to me? What more do You have to show me?

The fire is gone and in the cooling embers I see galaxies. I see my place on the table, my place in our bed. But I am gone, destroyed but not dead. I see three white stars glowing in the depths of the ash. I think they are teeth, gnashed out in the anguish of the fire, unrooted by the collapse of my body into burnt ash. But, even teeth burn. These are no teeth. I look down upon this seething alter and I see through time. I see young, hot galaxies; a place of chaos, a place of creation; the formation of stars and galaxies expanding through time. If I am seeing it, then the explosion must have occurred long ago. The fire has already happened. Where am I in this vastness?

How does this bring me to being the girl in the water? I feel my young girl body, no breasts, thin arms and legs, coasting through brackish waters. Dark, hot, amorphous water flows across my flesh. The chaos is here too, in the fluidity, in the possibility of the water.