I read this aloud, and it continually slipped for me between tale, oral history, and lyric meditation. Its reliance on the grandmother’s voice (laden with ancestral knowledge and handed‑down cosmology) evoked the cadences of oral tradition, as if I were listening in on a story told and retold by a long line of keepers. At the same time, its long, ruminative sentences and recurring images of seeds, scars, stars, and the whale’s body give the piece an inward, reflective charge, so that the real movement lies in thinking and feeling through language in the present. By the end, something in that language—its rhythms and returns—kept sounding in me long after the last word, leaving me both lulled and slightly disoriented, as if I had been listening to a story that outlasts any single teller, and always will. Thank you, Costance. I look forward to reading more of your stories.
Lucinano, You take my breath away for this journey you were able to take and send back to me. Many thank you's for spending the time. I have enjoyed your writing in the pages of Juke very much as well. We can thank Tonya for her patience, letting us all unfold, and her judgement. Constance
Wow! Thanks for unlocking the key to this vision, this dream. I need to re-read it. Amazing movement.
Apologies. I hit my own "like" button twice. Maybe not a sin. Constance
I read this aloud, and it continually slipped for me between tale, oral history, and lyric meditation. Its reliance on the grandmother’s voice (laden with ancestral knowledge and handed‑down cosmology) evoked the cadences of oral tradition, as if I were listening in on a story told and retold by a long line of keepers. At the same time, its long, ruminative sentences and recurring images of seeds, scars, stars, and the whale’s body give the piece an inward, reflective charge, so that the real movement lies in thinking and feeling through language in the present. By the end, something in that language—its rhythms and returns—kept sounding in me long after the last word, leaving me both lulled and slightly disoriented, as if I had been listening to a story that outlasts any single teller, and always will. Thank you, Costance. I look forward to reading more of your stories.
Lucinano, You take my breath away for this journey you were able to take and send back to me. Many thank you's for spending the time. I have enjoyed your writing in the pages of Juke very much as well. We can thank Tonya for her patience, letting us all unfold, and her judgement. Constance
Such exquisite writing!