A Letter from an Old Grandmother

about eating

[art: by Gabriella Possum Nungurrayi, 2017]

What we knew, that you have forgotten, is how we feed each other.

We knew how, if a mother died, or an old one passed over, to recognize her when she returned—the deer stepping into the glade and meeting our eyes, the salmon with the lithe silver body writhing in our hands, the swan spreading her wings as she landed before us showing us her heart. “Take eat, this is my body,” one of your wise ones will say, trying to help you remember the old ways. But you will think it is only his body that feeds you, only his body that magically transforms from flesh into bread and wine. No. No. No. We all do. We all die and come back. Every seed of grain, every grape from the vine, every goat and sheep that you eat was once your mother, your grandmother, and their mothers and grandmothers, who have loved you through vast cycles of leaving and returning. These mothers and grandmothers are always ready to feed you with their bodies.