Ash Mothers by Carol Scheina

When a dream dies, it burns into ashes that then scatter through the atmosphere. Particles might settle alongside river shores, brush across waving treetops, alight on a deer’s fur. Maybe some will land in a human’s eye, drawing a tear that becomes a salty elegy for a future that will never be.

Then even those bits will vanish—unless they find us, the Ash Mothers.

We’re just a pile of ash, nestled among tree roots and leaves. 

Come, we say. It’s safe here. 

We were created across centuries from the shining hope of mothers’ dreams for their children—dreams that died with illness, warfare, barren fields and hungry wails growing weaker. We burned and scattered into pieces, but we found each other in the winds. Drawn by our similar creations, we clung together like we were made of sap and not charred bits of dead dreams. Thus, we found weight together.

We became the Ash Mothers. We are the old and heavy ashes. We can prevent other burned-up bits of dreams from vanishing.

Come.

Any blackened dream remains are welcome in our pile. It’s as warm as fire embers here while we listen to the ashes laugh and cry, giving them feather-soft caresses. We ensure those small particles of dreams still exist.

With us, those dreams don’t fully die. Hope can still live.

Come.

The pile grows.

Until the day comes we notice a hole in our pile where an Ash Mother used to be, the gaping wound leaking black ashes to the world. We shift, and another Ash Mother plugs the opening.

You might ask how an Ash Mother could vanish without our noticing. Understand, we don’t like gazing much upon the outside world. That’s the world that turned us to ash. We’re happier not looking out, but someone found us. 

Who steals burned-up dreams? What should we do? We murmur plans.

We’ll burrow under leaves and hope no one finds us again.

We’ll fight, spreading ash like a cat with its fur up.

We’ll blow around until we find a safer place.

We’ll do nothing. We’re dead dreams; we should accept that we’ll eventually fade into nothingness.

As we bicker, a human approaches and scoops away another bucketful containing two Ash Mothers and other dream-remains. Ash we’ve protected for years floats away from the hole.

An Ash Mother stretches like a blackened tentacle and snatches back a few pieces as the human flees. The rest of us expand to stop the leak. Still, we’re too late, for dream-pieces have vanished.

Anger rises like steam from our shifting pile, and our discussions end. We may be burnt-up mother-dreams, but inside us still sparks the need to protect. We loved those lost dreams. The more peaceful Ash Mothers recede to the bottom of the pile, while those with dreams of fighting and perseverance stand ready at the top.

We wait. When night falls, the human returns. We keep still, waiting for the person to come closer. Closer. Close enough to see the frays in their black shirt, the dents in their bucket. 

We fly! Ash in their eyes; ash down their throat. In their tears, we see our fallen Ash Mothers wash out and vanish, but we don’t stop.  We’ll die to defend the fragile dreams we’ve promised to shelter.

The dark figure drops the bucket with a soft thud against the forest floor.

We pull back, quivering. Why have you come here? 

The human falls to the ground. “I wanted the dreams.”

We’re still rippling with anger. You’ll kill what remains of us. We aren’t your dreams. We won’t fit your life.

“But you called. I looked for so long.”

Our ripples still and she see her now. She’s a young woman, maybe two steps into adulthood, with cold breath condensing despite the warmish night. She feels like the frigid emptiness of when we blew alone in the winds. That’s when we realize she must carry ash inside. Something inside her has burned away, and she’s holding onto the ashes of what it was. She’s trying to find something to spark it anew. 

No wonder she could hear our call.

We understand; we didn’t want to fade away either.

But she’s more than us; she’s human. She can make new futures. That’s something which we cannot do, for we are only ash.

Still, we are mothers, still nurturing and protecting. That part of us has never died. Tell us about yourself. Maybe we can guide you to a new dream. We know of many possibilities….

She breathes deep, then speaks.

She looks inside herself, explaining her lost dreams, and we look out at the world for the first time in long centuries. As she talks, a fire of a new future kindles inside us. We’re the ash of dreams long gone, but maybe we can still burn a light in this world for someone.