I’m back on my ship. It is where I return when I’m in need of control. Yet it is also the space where I relinquish it as well. Surveying the surrounding clouds, I paint swirling shades of purple and blue into the shadowed shapes as I wait to sail. My first mate greets me and I find the same grounding in reaching to scratch between his ears. He curls up for a nap on the deck and I’m comforted that he’ll be staying with the ship for this journey.
A gust of wind catches the sails as water rushes around the sides and carries us along. I consider returning to the wheel, as we did the first time, but instead turn to face the skies before us. I raise my hands and release any charter or path. I beckon the current to take me where I’m needed and I brace for the breach of the first wave. My legs tremble for a moment as I remind myself to trust. We fall, riding with the current. I put my arms out into the wind and let it blow away an ashy sediment from my fingers and limbs that we no longer need to carry. We sail for a long while coming to a river lined with trees. They feel familiar but I cannot place them confidently. Not until we flood down the same steep path where trees once jumped into trails and landed with a splash in the same lake that’s claimed a tractor or two. We come around through the same curtain of willow, pass the cattails, and follow the bend to Chikie’s Spot. The driftwood sign still claiming the small island all these years later. I feel a pang of shame to have forgotten such a treasure but surrender it into the night. There is no use for shame here. It brings no bounty.
I beach my ship and head down to explore the tiny island. Surrounded by the same trees, it feels as protected from the outside world as it did when I’d escape here. In recognizing the opportunity to play as I did before, I form an onyx cave out of the dirt and roots of the hill behind. I follow the path in, allowing the same moonlit waters seep in with me. I dive into a glowing lagoon of otherworldly blue and feel the cool water wash over every inch of skin. I have not swam in so long. I float atop the water and consider how impossible it feels to have no pain in water so cold. I’ve never enjoyed the cold as much as I do in this moment without bones rattling about. The moonlight darkens from the entrance of the cave and the glowing waters dim below me. Shimmers of purple and green and blue move across the top of the cave with splatters of gold atop, light reflecting from somewhere. Light reflecting from me. A golden glow comes off my skin and reflects in sweeping colors on the pearlescent ceiling. I stretch out and test its shine against the stone walls. It is good but it is not enough. I kick back diving down into the bottom of the lagoon. Swimming deeper and deeper, I remind myself I can breathe. Down becomes up as the deeper from the lagoon’s surface I travel, the closer to a diamond night sky I arrive. I swim to the surface, intensely aware of my smallness amongst the endless vast canvas of water and sky. I twist in the water arching and playing growing that same golden light. I let it all free, casting it out far into the deep reaches of the dark waters around me. I let the light slip out without holding back, let it fill the shadows as far out as it can stretch. I shone, my own sun. Without restraint or hesitation or shame. I stayed and stretched and felt. Took in what it was to let it all out. Retained what semblance I could to return with me. I know it is a shine I must share. One that will take practice, just as we are practicing stretching its rays out here and now.
