I tipped the tray and felt the sudden heat

I tipped the tray and felt the sudden heat

of gray dust rising up to meet my face.

It tastes like lighter fluid, bitter and sweet,

a chemical ghost of this empty place.

A smudge of black across my laundered sleeve,

a thumbprint from a fire that’s long gone cold.

It’s funny how the things we try to leave

are always the things that take the firmest hold.

I scrubbed the cotton till the fabric thinned,

but the carbon’s woven deep inside the thread.

Some sparks are meant to scatter in the wind,

and some just leave a stain of what is dead.