What has happened to me is more profound like a fish underwater beginning to say words.
Yemoja swallowed by brown water river depths, wondered if her hands would numb as death eddied around her. Lungs hissed. A Tilapia chased and thumped her sideways. The fish tried to unspool any food in her hands to feed the baby in its mouth. Yemoja swerved and tapped the tail of the fish like playing Four Chiefs Tag minus the colorful ribbons. Several catfish dipped past her. Yemoja took a deep breath, wobbled, and kicked her fin. A screech bubbled up, studied the end of her limbs where feet used to be. Her body thrashed to shake off the fish tail. I am dead. I have turned into a sea creature. A calm voice in the water said, Welcome, Ogun river goddess.

I.
There is a telling that rains had fallen for billions of years eroding the land. Hot magma rose becoming the Sierra Nevada Mountains. The crust stretched and split. Volcanic vents spewed lava. Then the world cooled.

The last remaining gray wolves discussed a way to survive. Villages of people had settled into their forests. At the winter solstice light poured down from the sky. Moons fell. Thick rain pierced the wolves' fur. The wolf-people with the body of a wolf and human faces became wolves who could speak, but now appeared sometimes as human or other times as a wolf.

That is why today wolf-people live among humans and gather in the woods on the shortest day.

II.
Fur becomes skin,
front legs, and arms.
Bodies rise toward the sky.
Slow steps.

III.
The stories about the wolf-people are true, says Sheila to herself.