Mogford Road

Murphy, North Carolina
Carolina Hinojosa-Cisneros, 2015

We danced alongside embers,

fireflies of the burning night,

arms grabbing for objects not visible. 

1992 changed our lives as we helplessly

reached for rusting buckets of water,

fighting against the fire angrily ripping

through our neighbor’s acre. 

Soon it consumed ours.

We stood stunned, fire

majestically braided into our home.

The crackles and splinters mocked us,

water buckets deliberately resting on our hips. 

Sweat caused our clothes to cling tightly

to our bodies like babies not wanting

to be handed into stranger’s arms.

There were many times throughout

our lives we could be framed in eternity,

different from the story in which

we were transfixed.