After the burning,
I kneel on the blackened ground,
sink my hands into the warm ruin—
roots like charred veins,
soil tainted with the bitter taste
of scorched dreams.

The air smells of ember and ash.
I wonder if the earth remembers
what it once had—
amid these remains,
a tender green dares to rise—
small vivacious sprout,
climbing into thin air—
feeling the shift within—
a slender belief in tomorrow.

I sit with it and say nothing—
watch the wind test its will,
watch it shiver, bend—
seeking balance.

And somewhere inside me,
a quiet warmth stirs—
not unlike the seedling,
not unlike the light it leans toward.

Perhaps this is how we begin again,
kindred, this seedling and I—
not in grand gestures,
but in small, defiant hope,
in the way we root ourselves
to what remains after a scorching
and trust the sky to find us.