Circe

by Madeline Miller

WHEN I WAS BORN, the name for what I was did not exist.

Let me say what sorcery is not: it is not divine power, which comes with a thought and a blink. It must be made and worked, planned and searched out, dug up, dried, chopped and ground, cooked, spoken over, and sung. Even after all that, it can fail, as gods do not.

“Yet you would dare to stay?” “I dare anything,” he said. And that is how we came to be lovers.

there are rare moments when another soul dips near yours, as stars once a year brush the earth. Such a constellation was he to me.

I touched the thought like a bruise, testing its ache.

It is a common saying that women are delicate creatures, flowers, eggs, anything that may be crushed in a moment’s carelessness. If I had ever believed it, I no longer did.

some people are like constellations that only touch the earth for a season.

He does not mean that it does not hurt. He does not mean that we are not frightened. Only that: we are here. This is what it means to swim in the tide, to walk the earth and feel it touch your feet. This is what it means to be alive.