Touched by Fire

 

News flash….California is on fire…again. It happens so often now that it isn’t really a news flash. So much devastation. So much loss.  Animals and people fleeing, homes and property burning, not to mention the acres and acres of very dry land and brush.  When will it stop??? Or is this only the beginning. This time it was a perfect storm, a perfect firestorm. While we still do not know how it started, the gale force winds have ensured its feeding frenzy, and it’s rampant.  I was at lunch yesterday with a good friend away from home when it happened and I didn’t even know until my wife texted me and said to be sure to use waze on my way home in case I needed to be re-routed due the to fire. For a second I was incredulous, it’s November…cooler weather…fire season is supposed to be over.  The thing is we no longer really have a fire season.  What we have is fire year round.  It’s been getting worse and worse with no end in sight. Every year it’s warmer…we no longer have what I call a winter. I used to look forward to winter and a break from the damn heat, but now winter seems like a milder summer.  It’s been so warm the last few years we haven’t even used the heater.  In the wake of all this tragedy I cannot even fathom how people can be in denial about global warming and the consequences.  Yet there are many who say that it’s cyclical or deny it’s even happening. I’m here to tell you mother nature is pissed, and she and the earth are fighting back against what we’re doing to her.  We live in a valley surrounded by hills, so the fire hasn’t ever gotten to us, it just surrounds us and chokes us out. It has come pretty near and there have been many times we have watched in horror as the hills around us burn.  Last night my wife’s entire apartment community where she works was evacuated at 3 am. It doesn’t matter how much money anyone has if we destroy the planet we all die, we all burn, and it’s only a matter of time before we are all touched by fire.  

 

Hurricane Hella Scorcha!

???????????????????????????????

Waves of heat wash over me

as my very own tropical summer

waxes and wanes…

 

For going on twenty years my body

has been imbued with sudden smolder

at a moment’s notice with increasing

intensity up to now…

 

But there is a light… way down at

the end of the tunnel peaking in…

as the first inklings of summer appear

and I am able to enjoy sporadic interludes

of radiating warmth that fail to bring

forth Hurricane Hella Scorcha.

 

Some days are tough to roll with…

But I can see far off in the distance at present,

the day when I’ll be able to bask in

the suns glorious fire without the swelter…

and I welcome it!

 

Copyright  6/3/2014

Dani Heart