On Fire

I

From my first memory to the fourth grade

I lived under the sun of constant summer.

Lemon trees to climb. Books. Bedtimes.

Riding tricycles on islands: Coronado and Oahu.

We left the West, all of it,

in a van, friendless, for Virginia.

Our stuff boxed and sent ahead.

California's last sunset a fire on the sea.

I stare at stars through the back glass

tightpacked enough to cast a shadow.

Hearing only engine and road hum.

Lulled, until all is awash in another light.

I am not frightened of the house on fire.

Windows pour flames upwards.

A few silhouette men watching.

No firetrucks. Just the whole house burning,

and them on the street, and us slowly

passing, witnessing, an awe at the thing.

More fire, fountains of it, washing out

starlight from the sky and anything other

than fire and witnesses from behind my eyes.

We passed on the right: a good omen.

A burnt offering to some power

fed all their furnishings, photographs, socks

burning linens, boardgames, bras,

all anchors and fastenings made bright light

then ash. Whatever they are caught

up in over. All comforts also:

the porch at night, kitchen table, couch.

Ruined and free, fire quit them

of the shackles and shelter they had.

Left them all naked of things.

II

Woody Guthrie's house went up.

His mother lit it. Mad, later

she would burn his sister.

And these only half of them:

his father had yet to survive somehow

his mother's match and kerosene

and his daughter die, burnt

in the apartment on Mermaid Avenue.

How he sang anything but bitterness,

or held his heart open to anyone,

or warmed himself at any hearth,

ever lit a candle or cigarette

or sang “you're so pretty

you'd make any mountain quiver

make hot fire fly from the hard rock..."

Passion a flame even for him.

Primitive to his pain and loss

the bright light that eats to ash

all its fed, and love a fire

too, and we aflame with it.

III

We answer the carcrash with candlelight

vigils. A quiet crowd with votives.

Cheap little lights and some company,

some comfort and then we snuff out

the little symbols of ourselves

and bear away the cooling dead.

We walk our children into the woods

having forgotten nearly all we knew:

red oak from white oak, laurel from ash.

These birdsongs blurring together

as we carry coolers of cold drinks

and the small bundle of split wood

bought from the boy at the gate.

We fuss with snacks until sunset

then laboriously light the campfire

we came here, really, to witness.

To sit a few times in our lives

in a dark, uncomprehended wood

within a ring of firelight.