Fires at Night

Some of my best nights have been spent at the base of a flame.

Campfires create their own ecosystems, tiny little worlds of being that are particularly well suited to the singing of songs, the telling of stories, and the eating of chocolate smushed between two graham crackers and bonded to a toasted marshmallow.

There's something about sitting right there at the edge of the great unknown, with your infinitesimal spark of light shouting up to a sky full of the echoes of long-ago explosions.

I like the way looking into a fire makes the darkness that much more inky. I love the way black night exposes a sighted person's dependence on light. Nights seem enveloping and without edges, and that endlessness in turn seems to draw me into a more creative place in myself.

"So gimme the light of a campfire, warm and bright, and give me some friends to sing with, I'll be here all night..."

(Thanks to the women of Sunday Scribblings
for their continuing inspiration.)