Campfire Songs

We used to sing, our voices calling tongues of fire up from the ashes. Our everyday hurts would roast and blacken, skin falling away to reveal the white clouds of innocence that lay inside. I could watch the shadows that danced on your face all night, telling me stories of ghosts and monsters under the bed. You used to reach out with fingers of wind and tame my wild hair with just one touch. But now it is five years later, and my hair runs free. All that lurks under my bed are dust bunnies that roll just out of reach. The only shadows that dance here are the ones in my heart crying for release, screaming in my chest each day that passes apart. I count the days that pass, my skin roasting in the tortured sunlight, blackening, cracking, falling away to reveal nothing inside. But I still sing, coaxing the smoldering embers, hoping for a phoenix to rise in flame and call you to me once again.