by my calculations, an estimated time of 12 days since i had been left upside down, tied by one leg to the rope that had ultimately suspended me for this period, and then snapped, or that's how it felt but it was indeed a metaphorical death, the gaining of new wisdom, the letting go of old, i unlearnt everything in the 12 days, and gained new insight and gifts for the tree i was dangling upon was the tree of the world and each day that passed i glimpsed a runic symbol that would offer me transcendence over finality.
i looked at the dead bird that lay within my own skeleton, dead from eating my own flesh. i picked it up in my dirt caked hands and cradled it close to my breath, and gave it life. for this is the secret of 12 days, my claim to second life, it lay upon the letting go of the idea of life itself, at the peak of ones life, a paradox indeed, symbolically speaking. cured or blessed one can never say, i walked out into the world with the bird upon my shoulder, a raven i named after myself.