Amazon Wildfire Courtesy Georgia State University

Fire!

Summer months are hot and dry,

there is a pall upon the sky,

all wished for quench of thirst,

renewal from whence new life burst.

But all was naught as thoughts desired,

most plants on verge of funeral pyred,

and though there was a loud retort,

it was only thunder, a flash report.

A marvel to those who watched,

power of gods mighty thrust.

To light the sky in such a rush,

to split the clouds from rain burst.

But nature is a fickle one,

instead of rain, cleft the blue,

one tree burst fire, and then two,

wind lifted fiery embers, too.

Whipped by the wind, small fires grew,

into a conflagration of extreme renew,

where all dead plants expired to ash,

start again from smoldering acrid trash.

Racing wildly through its fuel,

waiting patiently for rain renewal.

Jumping wildly from tree to tree,

overrunning all creatures there be.

Scent of smoke pierces the air,

burning eyes tell of be aware,

must escape at the quickest route,

no time to think, others recruit.

Beneath flaming canopy running for lives,

only the birds are the one who flies.

Rest of the animals relying on their feet,

some scurrying to burrows beneath the heat.

Screams cannot be heard above the roar,

as the wall of flame consumes all before.

Incinerating lifetimes of growth and decay,

in an instant of hellfire without delay.

For the lucky ones that escape and return,

new appreciation for what they have, they earn.

But for good fortune do they luckily survive,

when so many from before no longer thrive.

So green was my forest even times of drought,

now only barren devastation the gods wrought.

Copyright 2020 © Ronald W. Hull

9/24/20

View and print this poem here at my website.