A Resistance of Witches

by Morgan Ryan

“Show me a world that does not hate a powerful woman, and I’ll show you a world without men.”

her mother used to tell her that birds sang to each other in the morning as a way of making sure everyone had made it safely through the night.

We shared a body once before, she heard her mother say. I loved you then, long before we’d even met. I will always love you.

We don’t die, my love, Evelyn had told her, though Lydia remembered her mother’s eyes were red and rimmed with tears. Not really. We change, yes. We become other things—the grass and flowers, trees and wind and stars. We rejoin the Great Mother, and our souls disperse into the universe, and become a part of a hundred million other living things, forever and ever.

This is a story about mothers. I was unbelievably lucky to be raised by a mother who taught me from the beginning that words have power, and who modeled what it meant to live a creative life. Whatever magic I have, I got it from you.