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Consider the god of salmon.

There is a god of salmon, somewhere in the gravel and the pebbles of the spawning redd. All salmon are aware of it as soon as they are born, in their own, private, fishy ways, and remember their god of salmon when they leave the spawning grounds and journey into the saltwaters beyond.

Theirs is the god of journeys and returnings.

Eventually, every salmon is struck by the urge to return to the holy lands of its ancestors. They pray to the god of salmon, asking for protection against bears and other predators on the journey.

“Deliver us from eagles,” the salmon pray.

All animals get their own gods, and those animal gods get their own prayers. The gods of mice and rabbits and other small, squeaking, hunted things usually get prayers along the lines of, “Oh please, oh please, oh please…”

Unlike those fickle gods, parishioners of the god of salmon get results.

Salmon get miracles.

A salmon returns to freshwater and discovers that it can breathe.

A salmon swimming against the current watches its spine curl, its teeth lengthen, sees grey scales turn red.

A salmon comes to a waterfall and discovers that it can fly…

Eventually the salmon complete their pilgrimage, and return to the holy lands of their ancestors.

Many raucous orgies are held.

Hallelujah.

And then, exhausted, the salmon die. The land flourishes as residual nutrients run through creeks and estuaries.

And the god of salmon continues, buoyed on the souls and prayers of millions of martyrs.

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All rights reserved  by Daniel Burton

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Djamila Knopf on Instagram

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by Japanese photographer 𝐁𝐨𝐱 @box_box_you

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Medusa by Baldemar Rivas

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Temple of Leaves | Pazo de San Lorenzo | Nowness

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@ low_toner

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Winter sky

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" Kids don't remember what you teach them, they remember what you are " Jim Henson

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When did it happen:

my whole life rotted into predicting my last

life’s last moments—the great metal tolling as everyone I love drains back-

wards out of our coils into the great scream of space, will it happen—

when will it happen—

— Franny Choi, from "I Have Bad News and Bad News, Which Do You Want First," The World Keeps Ending, and the World Goes On

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Artemis, 黒イ森