Fire-starter (Poetry)

I did not start the fire —
I have no matches
no quaint pocket glass
to focus the sun’s rays —
no device in mind or body
my element is water —
I put out such flames.

The sudden heat was shocking —
a surprise
to see the way things blackened
overnight —
how the walls fell in without a fight
as though they’d long been waiting
to ignite — already primed.

Now everything is ash —
I’m covered in its grey and gritty streaks
and like a baffled phoenix in the midst
of a hundred burning cities
my eyes are sore from smoke
and staring through
these ruins.

The spark — the perpetrator eager for
a drama — he has fled —
vamoosed —
and whether he is smug I’ll never know —
destruction in his wake
a way of life
out there in the cold.