how we have been changed
the Californians speak of fire hardening
ask if we’ve done it
no, but perhaps it’s been done to us
so many of us are like the survivors
in a forest after flame
you see the blackened triangular fire scars
for decades reaching up from the earth
marking the moments
when the tree might have become wood
but there’s also fire softening at work now
a new tendency to give others the benefit of the doubt
to not question whether they might have
had their misfortune coming to them
to give whole-heartedly, finally
embracing the there but for the grace of God
or a shift of wind
go I humility we all ought to have
it’s much too soon to see
how this fire will mark us
how we might now meet the world
what tangled undergrowth might have been
cleared out of our chests by
such a fierce blaze
