Matrix

by Lauren Groff

And it was true, the religion she was raised in had always seemed vaguely foolish to her, if rich with mystery and ceremony, for why should babies be born into sin, why should she pray to the invisible forces, why would god be a trinity, why should she, who felt her greatness hot in her blood, be considered lesser because the first woman was molded from a rib and ate a fruit and thus lost lazy Eden?

And the ladies whose eyes grew misty in listening to the sad creature—these ladies in their endless circulation between court and chamber and chapel, with never a thought of galloping through fields, nor fighting nor hunting nor disputing nor reading the great dead philosophers nor swimming naked in a river whose current could grab their feet and throw them a mile, nothing but sewing and sighing over stories of courtly love, adultery, and secret suffering—these bony lady necks Marie could also imagine snapping in her huge hands.

Women in this world are vulnerable; only reputation can keep them from being crushed.

Animals are closer to god, of course; this is because animals have no need of god.