Aag
Incendie
Incendio
Benki
Ignis
Fire

Words are superfluous
sometimes.

Sometimes
the voices extinguish what the water cannot,
and the emotions dance higher than the flames.

Then the irony of our denial
becomes conspicuously stark
against the futility of our differentiation.

So why do we
revel in our distinction
if the fire doesn’t care;
if the fire merely burns;
if the fire reduces;
if the fire obliterates.

Ash looks the same
always. It’s soulless,
colourless, impassive,
homogenous.

Why does the reluctance
to accept that we’re
specks of dust- flecks of cold, invisible,
faceless ash-
cling to us so stubbornly?