CAPPADOCIA 38°39’31.3”N 34°51’11.5”E LIANNA MARIE
“Horses lend us the wings we lack.” – Pam Brown
my ancestors didn ’ t start here , but this land beneath the Erciyes Mountains is the only home I’ve ever known. It holds a strange kind of freedom, a feeling that I’m wild and free but somehow, not fully my own. It’s possible to grow fond of, and even respect, those who hold power over us. Most days, I wander freely across the valley, my days marked only by the sun’s arrival and the darkness of night. At night, he arrives—a man unlike the others, with a way of sitting calm and at ease on my brother’s back. My brother carries him without resistance, and in their movements, I see a partnership that’s hard to understand; my brother belongs to him. But simultaneously, they belong to each other in some unspoken way. As the sun dips down, the landscape comes alive once more. The dogs circle around us and burst with excitement. I worry one day I may step on them as they dart between my legs. The dogs circle and press us together, running alongside my brother and his rider, guiding us in one direction, our hooves beating as one and our manes chasing the wind. In the rush, I see her. A woman with her camera in hand. She stands still while my brothers pass her from both sides, her eyes steady and warm as she sees us. When our gazes meet, there’s a quiet understanding, a shared stillness that settles any unease I feel. I think she senses the same, and in that moment, it’s as if she whispers to me, “I see you.” It’s not every night I see the cowboy and his dogs, but when they come, my brother and his rider lead us to meet the humans they bring with them. Our herd stretches over the land like shadows. I don’t fully understand why they watch us this way. They marvel at our strength and the way we move, but they don’t run beside us, or ride on our backs, as he does. Perhaps they only wish to see what freedom looks like. I know the life I live could change one day; my brother seems to understand this even more. When he carries his rider across the mountains, I see a future where we could be bound to different paths, lives that ask something new from us. And yet, for now, we run, wild and free, as much as any creature can be. As the glow of the sun fades, they leave us once again, but here I stay, free to roam, free to run. She looks back over her shoulder, her eyes fixated on me as if to say, “I see you still,” in that moment, I know she understands something, even if I can’t name it. The look in her eyes and the softness in her smile, I know it. I know that tomorrow, as a new day dawns and then sun again begins to set, my brother and his rider will come back to me, guiding us together through the twilight, a balance of my freedom and his power. And I will continue to run, to feel the earth beat beneath my hooves, the mountains watching over us as a promise from long ago. I wish for the others to know what it is to roam as I do, to understand what it means to feel free. Perhaps, in their own way, they do. in cappadocia , the “land of beautiful horses,” dust rose in great clouds around me, finding its way into every corner of my camera, thick and warm in the late afternoon sun. I wonder what goes through the mind of a horse? As I stood among them, as they rushed past me. Each one, unchained and free to roam, time slowed as they came
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MOTHER VOLUME FOUR
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