Deep down inside I’m a firebug.
I love to watch things burn.
The rising smoke hangs omens in the air.
The scent of the herbs clings to my hair.

Sometimes you just make the same mistakes
over and over and over again,
and you really don’t learn anything.
It’s just wasted time, a bad dream.

The flame dances; it warms the air.
The flame sparkles in the eye,
the incarnation of hunger, it rises,
and you feel it all again, no surprises.

We set a million fires just to watch
them burn slowly down,
the coals red against the velvet night,
the lonely shrinking of the sullen light.

We sift through the cool ashes
with our fingers which tremble.
There was a fire that burned here once
but now we just remember.



Syd Weedon
February 3, 2023