House Fire

Past the pool, white and dry,
a square, slanted sink,
Past the men whose forearms shook
like woodpecker wings,
Grappling the hard-nosed, tip-toed jackhammers,
To view the house that had been burnt down
At three a.m. on Sunday morning.

The house, which was just a house,
Before the fire turned it black,
Before it became something else,
Stood like a gothic monument.

It’s façade, charcoaled outlines of siding,
The empty eyes where glass had protected
the children from wind and fear,
was quiet and calm, unaware.

The hole in the roof, where the orange
And blue flames licked the bottom of the
Night.

The family must have scrambled.
The children mentioned in the news
Must have woke coughing and shook
The others awake.
Their mother, their father,
Must have climbed the stairs,
Brushing the smoke from their eyes,
And called for their children
Who were shadowed in the dark
And light from the fire.

And I,
I was sleeping.