healing ritual with river skin

 i.

identify the land on which the injury is made.
find water.
thank the generations who protect this.
hold your skin accountable to them.
pay tribute, reparations.

inscribe expanding spirals on a round stone offered by the river.
if the river offers no stones, wait a week.
a guide wearing a swan’s wings will bring you seven stones; you may choose one.

once granted invitation, climb above the water.
if not granted, wait a season; learn, and try again.

ii.

the stone is mineral medium for protection
and extracts the injury hidden inside the body.

when the river calls your name out, cast your stone into their water.
when the river spits its long, silver esophagus to hold your stone
measure the devil’s throat, bright hiccough channel; it will speak
for you, silver projection of your own voice in the river’s mouth.
the length it speaks will tally what you’ve lost.

iii.

the river cools the swollen blister of your stone, a swallowed harm.
it shrinks and sinks into a flowing place among so many stones, a cradle for pain’s smallness.
above this, skin will form upon the river’s surface as on scalded milk.
gather the skin once it has formed and fold its corners down.
crease twice across.
create a lantern as it dries.

the hands of seven many-gendered kin will join you.
one will tell you of the new body she grows inside her body.
one will smell of smoke and brings a book of matches.
one is an emissary from among water-protectors.
one is young and watches your hands for instruction.
all of them have borne this ritual before.

together, hold the lantern high and light a fire in its mouth.
your hands will foam the river’s surface with your heat—a gift of thanks.
let go.
the lantern will drift upward in the wind and be enfolded, then dissolve into itself.

iv.

turn to the shore.
to heal is to affirm the body’s pain and palm its stones,
to wash its wounds in water, to boil warmth, to light a fire,
to know the lantern will eventually burn out
and not to need to wake it where it falls.
to heal is to allow rivers to cauterize for you, and to attend in mutual care.

every action has its counter.
each sunken stone a flight.
each weight a weightlessness.
each letting go a holding forth, an offering.
wait three more seasons for the gift the river grants you in return.