AN EMBERED LIFE REMEMBERED

When life looms indecipherable,
the fire raging in the attic
fueled by a lifetime of memories
like a half-forgotten diary bundled
in an old travel trunk, sends up
into the ember-streaked night
charred diary pages of worry
rising on updrafts of chance
escaping on determined winds
and then drifting down
into a wasteland of recovery
where you can find
the charred pages of worry
lying in an improbable oasis
of open-eyed optimism.

Recalling the fire in the attic
and reading the script of memories
in the newfound diary spaces,
a healing life, a renewed life,
can be written on the blank pages
that are yet scorched at the edges
by the already lived embered life
smoldering and openly remembered.