Chameleon Magazine

A child wandered through a vast wilderness no one had dared to claim. Her people called it “the nothing”—a place too wild to belong to anyone.

But the child bent down, pressed her palm to the soil, and whispered, “Earth.” She stood by the roaring waves, cupped the spray on her tongue, and said, “Sea.”

Her tribe laughed at her—what foolishness, to name emptiness! Yet when they spoke her words aloud, the wilderness shifted. What had been terrifying became familiar; what had been meaningless grew roots in memory.

By the end of her walk, the people no longer feared the land or the waters. They carried her names on their lips like blessings.

“The world becomes good the moment we dare to call it ours.”