After the fires
by Lynne Ellis
they came back to air
still full of ash. An orange sun.
A likewise orange moon.
After the fires they unpacked the car.
After the fires
they thought nothing had changed.
Their house still intact—one of the few.
They thought the orange sun was
a friend calling down to them.
They thought
the orange moon could sing
their travel story—they’d driven clasp-handed
across the burning hills, as smoking trees stood
still by the highway side.
As they passed by, their fingertips
blistered and lifted up to the atmosphere edge.
After the fires they sat on chairs
in their spared house, unmoving, in fear
for their singed skin. Orange disks rose and fell,
steady in the ways of twenty shared years. One said
What have we made here? One said Don’t you see?
Ash fell out of the air, covered the car,
covered the magnolia tree. After the ash
their skin pinked again, they moved again.
They walked outside to air and white moon.
Lay back on charred bark.
They watched the sun
rise as a yellow star.
Lynne Ellis (she / they) writes in pen. Their words appear in Poetry Northwest, Sugar House Review, The Shore, Barzakh, Pontoon Poetry, and elsewhere. Winner of the Missouri Review’s Perkoff Prize, and a nominee for the Pushcart Prize, Lynne believes every poem is a collaboration. More on Instagram @stagehandpoet. Ellis is co-editor at Papeachu Press, supporting the voices of women and nonbinary creators.