T H I N G S T H A T
W E F O U N D
I N T H E F I R E
Meditations on fire.
In the consideration
of passing, things move
on. Moments flicker.
Friends pass. Miracles whorl.
And new things come out —
in another understanding.
In the passage of events,
learnings turn, discoveries
translate, and in this,
visions emerge.
Fire and the firing
is like that — the
metaphor of things
transformed, objects
translate to new
revealing. And in the
person, the discovering
of fire, what is seen —
is changed. Wandering
as I have, over the world
I’ve seen the agent of
fire, in prayer, in offerings.
That taking something to fire,
changes it to another force
the spiritual smoke of
migration — from one
dream, to another.
Scent, incense, curls.
That object, newly made
in the alchemy of flames
becomes something newly
seen and empowered. You
watch it go up to the
starbound skies and it
mixes that essence with
the wind, the song in the
trees, and is made anew
while the rest of the
earth seems stable.
In that magic balance of
the one to the other,
fire creates a new
migration, of the made
to a new dream.
Sitting by fire, offering
something to it, taken
to the flames, it goes
and anew, to seeing.
And you learn something
in that passage, the heat
molds your watchful
sight, sense is tuned.
And you too become
one with the flame,
the dream, the prayer
called away, then to it.
—-
Tim Girvin
Decatur Island | 5.55am | 1.20.07