We gather around what remains
embers breathing their final orange
heat retreating into memory
All night we fed this hunger
log after log disappearing
into light into smoke
into the ghost-talk of sparks
rising toward patient stars
Now the fire takes back its promises
The wood's bright language
collapses to ash then silence
We watch it die the way we watch
all endings pretending
we are already warm
pretending the ash won't settle
like snow in our open palms
There is honesty in this diminishing
the way flame teaches us
that fierce things cannot last
that even light must consent
to darkness, must bow
to the silence it once held at bay
What remains is everything
The hearth holds warmth like memories
The air drifts with cedar and farewell
And we witnesses to this small extinction
carry the afterimage within our thoughts
proof that something burned here
bright and wild and brief
before it gave itself completely
to the patient work of ending
the necessary descent
into what comes after fire
cooling, always cooling
the last heat leaving us
like breath
About the Creator
Tim Carmichael
Tim is an Appalachian poet and cookbook author. He writes about rural life, family, and the places he grew up around. His poetry and essays have appeared in Bloodroot and Coal Dust, his latest book.
Keep reading
More stories from Tim Carmichael and writers in Poets and other communities.
Getting Serious About Comedy (Part I)
If I were asked to remark on my life and the childhood that paved some road leading me to this point, I would have to say something about all the funny people who surrounded me for the last 26,872 days (and counting). Somewhere along that road, I became a big fan of laughter and the comedy that spawns it – and, I mean not only my own laughter, but the laughter of others, some of which I have actually been responsible for inducing.
By John Oliver Smith5 days ago in Humor
Comments
There are no comments for this story
Be the first to respond and start the conversation.