Counting down, day to today, to the ritual experience; scripted in the epitaph of a generational ghost in promise that you’ll never be this precise, antiquated character to claim as the self once more. It’s not a transformation, it’s not a stage; we’ll take you all-together and break apart the version of the self you go by the name of today. You’ll never see the person you might have become. You’ll never see yourself again, not in reflection, not in memory’s heaviest of all projections. We’ll take the singularity from the soul. Oblige only that you caste aside ego; come to the den where mother bear valiantly opposed the murderers of her kin, come to your knees before the

Ten masses who rearrange themselves as the tribe tears you from the hierarchy…

don’t look at them; they’re here to convince you that you’re not one of them, and don’t speak to them; they’re here to swallow your voice and numb your intestines. Refrain the urge to acknowledge the clansman beside you, their journey is not for you to know. But come as if you were alone, as with your only possession of time and come during the unclouded night when the second moon has risen, bring

Nine totems of heirloom – of that which you’ve known and your ancestors given…

burn them by dawn, so that shamans may lift their uncleaned hands and powder your sullen cheekbones with the ashes and gently kiss the palms of your hands with crimson lips. Hear them bring chant over your arched back as you sway in the fumes; the release of the witchcraft from the wicked and their blackened, stained eyes. To meet the gaze of gods and saints in

            Eight forms; sturdy bones – don’t you dare shake before them… ask for favor, that

when they return you, may you not accept the villain’s bid, but return the marrow to form. May you vomit or sweat, repent ‘fore creator calls you back. Follow the whistle to be drawn home, look for the smoke through the valley of the hungry tundra to find the beating of your heart chasing alone, after

            Seven stars to the east in the shaman’s lightning… where raven hunts snakes

before touching the hand of the ridgeline. walk along the knuckles of the saddles backwards, noting the patterns of the molten earth’s phalanges as erecting sequoias in the bedding of forests. Drink the ode to similarity; echo of the biological, the botanical, the geographical, the electric. To what might

            Six-th sense recognition forbear reintegration… once you’ve eaten these cores

formed in the meeting of lightning, roots, rivers, and veins. We’ll pull you back into this fragile existence despite any divine resistance. Listen for the

            Five beats of the drum to confirm the finality… maybe an extra to ensure

your consciousness stays deaf to the peculiarity. Balancing suspicion as it resonates; distinguishing between sensation and uncertainty, between body and being. Look into the soul – what could it be

            Four questions of rigidity… in ceremonious muttering

To volumize the incident of breathing, to idolize the happenstance of sentience and what does it mean? in

            Three seconds of silent passage; how else to come into an ending

what does it mean? when

            Two suns rise without sunsets, but

what does it mean; if there is only

            One lifetime per entity… what does it mean; if

none of it means anything?

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