We Are Rat Kin: Worthy Of Every Poem

What this episode covers

I have such a strong visceral reaction to even the sight of this animal on a screen that in my childhood my sister decided I must have died of Bubonic Plague in a past life. I’m not afraid of much - heights, spiders, public speaking, none of these things bother me in the slightest, but a single glimpse of that skinny tail and I freeze in abject terror. And much like how we humans have been socialized to think, my fear manifests as hatred and disgust. I see it everywhere - on my timeline, in the streets - how fear turns to anger, how fear turns to revulsion. So today, I turn to the vast tales and skinny tails of Rats, to discover how we are the same, what makes us kin, what I can learn from them and why I should be grateful they exist. I am human, and the best I can do is to examine my fears, locate them in space, time and in my body, question their validity before scared turns to angry, before scared turns to disgusted, before fear turns to destruction. I’m gonna work through this, Rat Kin, with you, not against you. Though even in the writing of these introductory paragraphs, I can feel my stomach starting to turn, my skin starting to crawl, I promise not to turn away. I’ll go with you into the dark recesses of your life and hopefully leave my phobia there, underground. Consider this a training ground, Witches, to take what we learn and use it all as an antidote to hate, as I skulk and scuttle through the sewers of my own mind, to find amid the filth and muck, a warm place in my heart to love a Rat. Today, I am Rat kin. https://www.missingwitches.com/ep-293-we-are-rat-kin-worthy-of-every-poem

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