By Katie Ford
When a human is asked about a particular fire,
she comes close:
then it is too hot,
so she turns her face—
and that’s when the forest of her bearable life appears,
always on the other side of the fire. The fire
she’s been asked to tell the story of,
she has to turn from it, so the story you hear
is that of pines and twitching leaves
and how her body is like neither—
all the while there is a fire
at her back
which she feels in fine detail,
as if the flame were a dremel
and her back its etching glass.
You will not know all about the fire
simply because you asked.
When she speaks of the forest
this is what she is teaching you,
you who thought you were her master.
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I had a busy Wednesday -- a bunch of work, lunch with Karen and Jim at Lebanese Taverna, a bunch of shopping, a walk with raid friends at Wall Park around the Kennedy Shriver Aquatic Center, then a bunch of chores at home including a disastrous avalanche when I tried to reorganize a shelf in my bedroom that required a lot of cleanup. And I can't even blame the cats.
We watched an episode of Bones for the first time in weeks, then Designated Survivor, which has got to write the First Lady better. What was most memorable on the news, though, were the images of California burning, with the Skirball and Thomas Fires raging through places we drove in August. Here are photos of some of them from the same roads as the news footage.
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