The Nature of the Sky

                      When I was a babe, my mother, the earth, spoke to me.  "My child," she said, "the sky is a river, and our world swims through it.  The stars you see at night are other worlds, and we are all carried in the Great Maker's net."  Then she granted me dreams of strange skies and different seas, and I believed her.
                      When I was old enough to hunt alone, my father, the moon, spoke to me.  "My child, the sky is a great valley, and the sun a buffalo that roams through it.  The stars you see at night are the mighty warriors who pursue the sun."  And he granted me dreams of strong hunters and a shining prey, and I believed him.
                       You tell me that the sky is empty space, and the stars are giant fires burning very far away.  You tell me that the river and the valley are illusion, that the hunters and the worlds are myths and falsehoods.  You give me not dreams, but ideas as cold and hard as the iron tools you bear, and ask me to believe you.  And I do believe what you say, of the sky and the stars.
                       Yet just because the sky is empty space, why should it not also be a river, and a valley?  Just because the stars are enormous fires, why should they not be hunters and worlds as well?  You think you have knowledge, but you have closed your eyes.
                        Shall I teach you to open them again?

The Mythology of a Future Race

                      In the beginning, there were the gods.  And the gods were many as the hairs of the coat, and covered the whole world.  Yet still the gods were lonely, so they said to one another, "Let us make companions for ourselves, who shall be as Children to us, and we shall love them."

                      So it was that the gods took Beasts of the land, and raised them up to be Children of the gods.  And the Children of the gods flourished and spread across all the land, until they numbered more than even the gods.  Many of the gods loved them, but certain of the gods were Corrupt, and began to fear and to hate them, for the Children were many, but they were innocent, and in their innocence showed the Corrupt their own evils.
                      And the Corrupt began to mistreat the Children, saying, "They are only wild Beasts."
                      And the Pure gods admonished the Corrupt, saying, "They are our Children, do them no harm."
                      But the Corrupt would not cease, and soon there was a Great War over all the world, as the Pure and the Corrupt fought for the fate of the Children.  And the Great War was as a Beast which devoured the land for many generations.  Then the First of the Pure looked at the world and wept, for the Children suffered by the Great War, even where the Pure reigned.  So the First gathered the Pure and said "We must combine our power, and take the Corrupt out of this world, so that the Great War will plague our Children no longer.  But such a miracle will require a Sacrifice, for we too will go out of this world."
                      And the Pure answered with one voice, "We will Sacrifice for the good of the Children, and our Bodies shall sustain them."
                      So the Pure joined their power, and they abandoned their Bodies.  And they hunted the Corrupt, and took them out from their Bodies, so that in all the world the gods were no more.  Then they created a new world, where the Pure could dwell in peace.  But the Corrupt also created a new world, and they began a Second Great War between the worlds.
                      Then the Children ate of the Bodies the gods had left in Sacrifice, and they grew wise as the gods were wise, and knew good from evil.