Everywhere else Persephone was just another goddess of the Pantheon, but in Locri, she was the goddess.

There is always something to distract us, something urgent, usually unpleasant, so I’m going to say this really fast, before I lose your attention: last night I heard the roar of the planet spinning on its axis, the deafening breath of an enormous creature.

Have you ever watched the moon rise on the ocean on a bright summer night when all the stars are out and by their light alone, you see your shadow?

Such was the beauty of Cimmy’s garden, and how proud she was of it! It was the most beautiful place on earth, she thought, this walled garden of hers, this heavenly shelter in the middle of existence, this place where everything was flawless.

There was a place inside this knot of metal limbs from which he could see the entire manifold branching overhead; it made him feel that as small as he was, compared to this enormous metal monster, he was the soul in the machine, the essential component that allowed the whole system to work.