Ashes

Breathe in, then breathe out. An explosion of light and heat leaves rich ashen loam in its wake, and then all of a sudden a hundred little shoots poke out of the soil and we feel the sigh of the world all around, the sound of life unfurling across years, decades, centuries even, wet and bright and spangled with color. Inhale, then exhale. Then it all withers away, then it's all burnt to cinders an…