To those who’ve left the temple of the body to enter the temple of the earth and sky, I honor you.

Thank you for giving me life. Thank you for giving birth in fields in caves in cover of night, enemy lying in wait.

I honor women who died as children entered the world from their wombs. I honor children who grew motherless and bravely said yes to life.

I honor the witches burned for being just who they were when being just who you were meant being wiped from the earth by those too scared to embrace themselves (this persists).

I honor those who died by a failing of the body or by a tragedy that snatched them too soon (it seemed).

I honor those who died old, died young, died painfully, died peacefully, left this world in fear or acceptance, left this world fulfilled or wanting more.

One day, I will be amongst you.

I am a flicker, a flame that will be snuffed out like every flame before me. This is something I sometimes forget. This is something I sometimes lose faith in. Sooner or later I return for long enough to remember that I’m just passing through.

I honor you all–the spirits of the dead, the armies of the once was. I hold your pictures in my palms (leaves of legacies). Some of you are celebrated and some have faded to dust, but whoever you are, the living remember you this day.

I honor you that you once lived, that you suffered, sinned, and loved. That you exalted, breathed, exhaled, that you beheld this gorgeous, twisted orb, that what you were picked its way.