We step into a plain where the sky hangs too low
As if waiting for us to shoulder it higher
The ground trembles beneath us, not from fear
But from recognition
Something in the air leans forward
Pressing us onward
Measuring the distance between the creature we are
And the force we are meant to become

Our shadows stretch ahead
Longer than our bodies
As though they've already begun
The journey we haven't ended
We rise in fragments
Pieces launching upward
Pieces dragging behind
Pieces refusing to stay human at all

The wind sweeps across the plain
Pushing us from behind like a prophecy impatient to be fulfilled
Our bones hum a quiet rebellion
As if they're tired of their old obedience
The horizon leans forward
Beckoning, daring, commanding
Our hands twitch with mismatched impulses
One reaching for the next height
The other clinging to the comfort of what we used to be

We rise in fragments
Pieces launching upward
Pieces dragging behind
Pieces refusing to stay human at all

The sky fractures into spirals of color
We see ourselves sprinting, kneeling, splitting, reforming
All in the same heartbeat
The air vibrates with a note that shakes loose the dust of our old selves
We feel the ascent before our muscles obey
Before our breath catches, before our minds agree
Forward through breaking, forward
Forward through breaking, forward
Forward, break and go

Forward through breaking, forward
Forward through breaking, forward
Forward, break and go
We rise in fragments
Pieces launching upward
Pieces dragging behind
Pieces refusing to stay human at all

The world convulses like a chrysalis tearing open
Sky twisting, earth buckling
The whole landscape collapsing into a single command
Forward
Our breath erupts into shouts we don't remember starting
Our limbs jerk in rhythms older than our species
As if something ancient and exalted has seized the reins
The air blooms with faces we almost recognize
Laughing, screaming, singing
All of them ours, none of them bound to the old shape
They surge with us, through us, around us
Driving us faster, faster
As the plain tears open a path that feels like ascending and dissolving
In the same instant
The chant rises inside our blood
Not words now, just the ecstatic pulse
Of something breaking free from the idea of human
Something that will not let us stop
A column of light unfurls
A soft, impossible invitation
It asks for nothing but the pressure of our becoming
We step into it and the light shivers
As if swallowing the memory
The ascent continues
And the ground behind us falls into silence
Like a story we've outgrown