Charred

(Photography by Ylanite Koppens - found here)

I held the world in my hand and let it drip
off my fingertips. I stroked its bony back,
and let it cover me like a bedsheet.
I thought I would grow like this, be happy like this.
I believed its thin, delicious promises all the way to my toes.

But then, the fire. Controlled, like the spring prairies
yet black death scarred my landscape for miles.
Like the sparrow, I fled from the heat to the sky,
straight to the doors of Heaven.

I am here now. I ready my throat;
the list to tell is long. My weak fist covers
my charred heart. My hard tears gather in the ashes.
Having died, I am ready to grow again.

The door opens.
Look, a green shoot.

~Laura Wifler