Hearth Song

image borrowed from bing

Hearth Song

“One may have a blazing hearth in one’s soul,

& yet no one ever came to sit by it.”--Vincent Van Gogh.

Our house was 

built in 1953, 1,500 square

feet upstairs, with

a full daylight

basement. We assumed residence in

1993, inheriting a

home already inhabited

by spiritual passers-by; both

frightening & fascinating.

Never the same

figures, all strangers just trying

to get home

themselves, trying to

find their way through the

maze of separate

dimensions, who stopped

to rest at our hearth,

before moving on,

resuming their journey;

a couple on the love

seat, a soldier

in a WWI

uniform, a young girl in

a shawl, holding

a rag doll,

a teenager in a poodle

skirt, a logger

wearing plaids; fully

revealed, just politely visiting, attracted

to our fire.

Our fireplace is

massive, a double-decker, with

full hearths upstairs

& down, with

a complicated fleu system, its

tiles fire-baked.

At first we

used it a lot, buying

several cords of

wood, & stacking

it on new pallets alongside

the house, &

yes, we fully

enjoyed the primeval fascination of

staring into open

flames, listening to

it hiss as it consumed

alder, fir, &

pine, warming ourselves

by sitting on its rainbow

rock shelf, &

there were several

winters that we kept the

home fires burning

for weeks unending;

but somehow, the love affair

waned, as enforced

burn bans, the

outrageous cost of firewood, the

filth & clutter

left on rugs

from hauling fuel to feed

its dragon maw,

& miscalculations with

the fleu, smoking up the

whole house, just

soured our ardor.

Now the basement fireplace is

covered with plywood,

then further mantled

with moveable shelves of DVDs,

erasing its existence.

Upstairs we keep

the tall brass shield erect

to discourage our

tiny grandchildren from

crawling up into it; standing

cold--flameless for

years; just remaining

decorative, something to hang holiday

swags & wreathes

upon, stones to 

dust, a silent roommate, a

mute companion, where

Hestia & Vesta

no longer hold court, abandoned

by janyas &

specters alike. Maybe

we ought to rekindle that

flame this winter,

& let them

all know that we miss

their visits, &

now they are

more than welcome to drop

back in--to

enrich our home

life, to be recipients of

our genuine hospitality,

to rebuild our

connection to the portals covered

with sad ash. 

Glenn Buttkus

Posted over at dVerse Poets MTB

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