so say she isn't a girl anymore. say she is a woman. i will agree with you, or at least nod out of politeness. but inside i know differently. i know that even now her childhood is the fullness of her life. and i know that this full, ripe woman we see now is only the thinnest thread-bare steeple rising out above the vastness of her youth. each passing year only stretches it further.

because i see her on occasion, out near the ruins, out on one of our windy hills of wheat, and when i see her there, i see someone much younger. i see her raven hair held back in the same bows that her mother, now gone, would tie for her in the morning. her dress is the azure plaid that was destroyed in a fire.

once i even lured her over to me with the promise of an apple. she knelt beside me on my blanket and grabbed the fruit from my hands, her eyes like mischievous twins conspiring to undo the kindness of my gesture.

even now, as i stand on the hill, brush and palette in hand, i can look over and see her there, on my blanket, hair awash in dreamy swirls of wind, deciding whether or not she should spit on me.

perhaps it all goes back to the time i saw her in the ruined church. perhaps this is the moment that rubs out all others.

i wasn't spying on her exactly. i was painting the statue of the slain hero as i do from time to time, a relic from the great wars now weather-worn and embroidered with lichen. a stone man, one of our town's heroes, in mortal agony, dispatched by an enemy's arrow. he kneels before the ruins of an altar, his arms outstretched as though he's holding onto all of life. he is made out of stone, though the arrow piercing his heart is made out of iron.

his eyes are made out of quiet hope.

i watch as she strolls into the picture without seeing me. her eyes fill with curiosity as she sees the slain hero with his pained but peaceful smile. she has never been here before. she has never seen this strange stone man with his stone tears frozen forever on his cheeks.

she creeps over to him cautiously. she knows he is still alive. she knows he might even hurt her, being made out of stone. all this she knows, yet still she grows closer, not meeting his eyes for fear of angering him.

ah, but caution is for the elderly. after gazing at her shoes for a moment she suddenly springs like a cat and lands at his knees in a ball. she giggles. the slain hero only continues to smile. she kicks him in the knee. he only continues to reach out his arms to a future he will never see.

she spits on him, as children like to do. it is meant more as a compliment than a challenge, but it is both. she raises her arms, prepared for a retaliation, but then puts them back at her side again and gazes at his face. she sees that his tears of stone are now rolling over his cheeks and falling onto the ground as pebbles.

she kicks one of them away with her shoe.

and then, always, she raises her arms to grab the arrow and pull it from his heart. it must be difficult to do this, because even now i can't make it budge from its tight stone home. for her it is effortless. she removes the iron shaft like pulling a reed out of water.

so you could say she lives among us in only the most trivial way. say that mostly she is out in the ruins where she spits on the slain hero, pulls the arrow from his heart, and wipes his tears away with the hem of her blue dress, the one that is now only ashes.

as for me, i try to paint the color of quiet hope. i can only find it in the slain hero's eyes, and even then, only after she pulls out the arrow. when that happens i see the blue of water and sky rush into those eyes, and then the green of misty hills in the spring, and then the black of trees in rain, and on and on through other, stranger colors. after a time, they all fade into a deep, shimmering gold which spreads from his eyes to every part of him.

and all along she sees only the face of her love, now freed from time. he reaches out to her and they embrace in the shadow of a ruined altar, and their lips meet and mingle, and their bodies mix together like the colors on my palette, and yes, for a time, she is a woman, not a girl.

some nights i see her in the taverns where she dances for the lonely eyes of men.

she unwinds the world in her movements, her body like fine marble made into flesh, awakened from stone by the heat of her passion.

i watch alone while she dances and unwinds the world. and while i am watching i find every once in a while i am putting my hand to my chest.

i notice my fingers are moving. i notice they are searching.

searching for a wound that is not there.

she watches me as she dances, knowing what i am doing, knowing what my fingers are trying to find.

she only smiles at my confused eyes.

at her feet are coins, laying like tears from golden eyes.