Joan of Arc is Channeling God and Teaching you to make S’mores

Let’s say they believed her.

Let’s say she was born into a different age. That she wasn’t the one who burned. Or:

Maybe in another life, she is the favorite camp counselor. She teaches the kids to ride horseback. She tells them to get back up when they fall. She wipes tears, and if they’re really too afraid, she lets them stand next to her at the center of the ring. She rubs their backs to release the last of the adrenaline. You can try again tomorrow.

There is no shame.

Maybe she’s the one who teaches the kids to juggle during a break between activities, to sword fight with branches they found on a hike. She prances, one foot in front of the other, across the fallen log across the river. Maybe she’s suspended by invisible wires. Come on! You can do it! She gives the kids encouraging smiles as they stretch their arms out wide for balance. In her mind, she counts each one as they safely make it to shore again.

Maybe now, when god speaks to her, it’s in the campfire songs and handclap games. She hears that clear voice in the musical shuffle of leaves in the wind. In the low hoot of the Great Grey Owl, the rare owl that hunts by day. In the high bark of the coyote. But still, every version of her can hear it. 

Maybe in this plane of existence, she’s the one to teach the kids archery: the grace and precision of the bow and the power of the wind. She passes on what her ancestor-self knew. She teaches the children to whittle, to carve small idols with their knives, a reminder of the way we pray with our feet on the forest floor, our eyes skyward. She teaches them ax-throwing, just in case.

Maybe when the sun goes down, she’s the one to build the fire. Her keen fox eyes have been on the lookout. Her rough hands gathered kindling all day. She’s the one to show the shy girl to tilt the logs toward one another, to make a spark with a flint,  to alchemize that potential into a bonfire to keep all the kids warm. She shows them how it sends crackles of heat into the purple night.

Maybe, even now, there’s a part of her that smells the smoke and shudders. Her skin prickles and recoils from the heat that feels too familiar.

But maybe, still, there’s the part of her that relishes this sweet ritual. She places a graham cracker in the palm of a child, and a square of chocolate. She shows them how to select thin, green sticks; to puncture the soft white marshmallow; to dangle them close to the heat. She laughs as she blows out the ones that catch on fire, explaining that the burned ones are her favorite. She laughs harder at the irony, stamping out the embers inside her that want to remember out loud. She uses a second cracker to extract the marshmallow from its spear, handing the sandwich to each precarious child. Not so much younger than she was when she first rode into battle. She wants the sweetness to keep them safe for as long as it can. She wants them to remember when days could end like this, when fires served this purpose alone, when this was the most sincere form of communion.

Maybe in this lifetime, this is how she puts herself to work. She learns other ways to wield a weapon. She learns other ways to talk to god. Maybe this time, she learns it’s safer to keep her business to herself.