The leaves have turned the color of fire,
and I have turned to making music:
that hollow, plunking sound
of stacking dry wood on dry wood.
***
Each note is a grateful nod to the future,
and each log is a portion of a promise.
After a lifetime of building these piles,
the movements come naturally,
and the song simply sings itself.
***
I am a winter witness to the power of fire.
I watch in wonder
as the spirit of a single spark
transforms potential energy
into welcomed comfort.
***
As the flames climb the octaves of warmth,
rising from red to orange to yellow to white,
this force that could easily consume us
agrees, instead, to shield us from the cold,
and to kindle the deep fellowship
that each of us so deeply desires.
***
We sit, side by side, around a circle of fire.
Our backs to the darkness and the cold,
our faces to the light and the heat,
our hearts to each other, and to our stories.
***
Washed by smoke, together,
we will carry the smell of today into tomorrow,
and our memory of each other will be warm,
like the soft glow of small embers
against a field of midnight black,
or the sound of a beautiful chord
strummed in an empty cathedral.
***
Today, I toss the logs with ease
that in years to come I will carry slowly,
and I concede that my orderly walls of wood
will give way someday
to piles of brush and brambles.
***
But as long as I am able to carry
a bundle of sticks on my back,
I will have fire,
and all that it gives so freely
to those who are willing
to sing its song.
Copyright 2025 Kesel Wilson (entirely, 100% human-created)
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Kesel Wilson 