999

Flames dancing their shadows Javanese hand puppets
jumping to sirens no chimes or gongs
burnished joists shift and settle
they're trapped as Bedouins housed
embers vehement they are a witch
spit shoot crackle
not like a New Year sky
and the stranglehold of a ghoul, black smoke


Stillness in this fire glow
swollen dolls
like seals basking in sunshine
no not dolls children saw I, two
deceased increased, heat inflated
to become charred relics of fleeting histories
carbon those ammonite children.