What does it mean to heal your inner child? To overcome past trauma? To find the puzzle piece that had been lost years ago, or in another life?
In a story in Pete Hsu’s short story collection, If I Were the Ocean, I’d Carry You Home, “Korean Jesus,” Hsu explains that the healing process means to be granted a wish, writing, “This second wish only comes to a few, just a few, and by just a few, I mean those few who didn’t wish for puppies and candy. I mean those few who wished for something else. Something desperate. Those are the few who sometimes come to be ready to be little again. You get me? To be little again. To be innocent again.”
And what does it mean to be innocent?