I’ve tended to these ember-laden forests.
This form belongs to this land,
and has lived in its fires from birth.
My skin, no longer a mere scorched vessel, but a home,
open and vulnerable against the sky.
The rains are coming.
I can smell the sweetness in the ash and dirt.
Nose to the ground, I am kneeling to what it’s taught me.
Silt water swells within my chest,
sputters from my mouth, my eyes.
Grasping the still red-hot embers of fires long dead,
gentle, with uncertain hands that shake,
I place them into my muddy mouth.
The heat upon the tongue is uncomfortable, familiar.
I chew, and chew, and chew, and… chew.
Hot charcoal transforms into gravel,
gravel to grit,
grit to sand,
sand to dust.
A slow…
deliberate…
careful…
digestion of the fire that licked soft skin and made it crumple.
The rains are here.
It unleashes its torrent, steam pulses, and embers crackle.
Its piercing descent upon the ground hurts no less than on my skin.
The rain mingles with the groundwater, with salt tears and soda ash.
Hisses from the scorched earth, thunders from above,
drowning the sound from my ears as chest wracks and stomach heaves,
coughing up the stale smoke tar, spewing the remnants of dust unbearable.
I allow the stinging downpour to cleanse it from my palms back to the drenched soil.
Deep within, a howl emerges, raw and new:
“Let me breathe in clear air
Let me exist without flinching
Let me hold the old wounds tenderly
Let me love without fear
Let me embrace kindness
Let me… be”