Creatures of Mud, A Parable
I saw something playing on the ground that appeared to be human. I crawled towards it and felt the ground break beneath me, the ground where this human sat. Wherever it moved the soil beneath its feet became fertile, spoiled with worms, insects, and centipedes that wriggled about. Then I got closer and saw that the human was a baby. She had the color of the mud, and she ate from the earth, nourishing her tiny belly with a fistful of dirt and worms. Then a lamb appeared, it looked lean and half dead. It moved past her in weakness, but she held the lamb by the heel before it got away. She did not know how brittle the lamb’s heel was, and it snapped. The lamb now stood on three legs. It tried to move forward but it couldn’t. She touched the lamb, more gently now and restored the broken heel. She sat with the lamb and fed it mud and worms. The lamb never left her sight. Then a snake slithered towards her. It rested just a few steps from her, blending in with the ground. It waited for the lamb to be fattened. Once the lamb had its fill the serpent approached and poised itself for a strike. But because the lamb had been colored by the mud, making it appear one with the baby, the snake accidentally struck the baby’s thigh instead of the lamb. Two deep gashes appeared on her side. But by tasting her blood the serpent’s fangs dissolved. It became toothless. She picked the snake up, coiling its string like body around her, and placed it next to the lamb. Her hands were over these creatures. She gave them the earth to eat.
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