The breeze today carries the pacific over the mountains and I salute memories stirred early this morning. Ocean airs bring ghosts and unfinished music to life again, to swirl around my silly head. They whisper and sigh, tap the lens behind my eyes and wait. I open up my windows wide to try and coax the air inside, to keep it by me a while.
West born winds are sometimes company for those whose minds fall in historic bends.
the devil winds have started again, stealing breath from my mouth and lungs. smoke and fire smells alternate on the shifting air. I’m burning again.
I wait until the house is quiet to pull the ladder out and climb onto the roof. I sit as high as I can to get a look at the mountains burning.
sun lit the smoke from behind this morning as it rose up from the fire rimmed eastern hills. the dawn normally pink, muddied brown and dangerous from soot.
an ember on a breeze lit the mountains to the west. now if I sit just so i can see towers of smoke in my peripheral vision. great thunderheads from hell.
a cinder lights on my head and quickly engulfs me in autumn fire. I dance as flames turn my clothes to ash and lick at my breasts and back. it scours me pure.
it’s the end of a cycle and a chance to remake elements of life into something different. something made stronger by fire. painful art of deconstruction contemplated atop my roof this monday morning.
Last of the Amazons by Steven Pressfield