Wildfires

The Cycle

The smoke of summer
A familiar haze
A harbinger of change
Signaled only
When the red sun rises

While the forest stirs
Embers flutter
Like fireflies 
Catching, growing
Beginning the cycle

Centuries gone
Fallen on the forest floor
Crackling, eaten, consumed
Until it stops at the break 
That divides life and death

And soon, silence
Rot has been cleansed
Soft showers cascade down
And in the soot 
Sits a sprouting seed