The House Burned Down

by Janet Ruffin

The house I grew up in burned down a few years ago; all of it.
It burned to the ground.

The man who lived in the house at the time died in the fire.
His wife had died a few months before.
He grieved hard for her I was told.
He lit candles for her every night;
that's how the fire started.

I am sad that he died that way,
but I'm happy the house burned down,
all of it;
especially the back room.

I moved away from that house when I was eighteen.
Through the years I would drive by to check it out.
The man and his wife had painted the house pink.
They bought the lot next door so their yard was bigger than when it was ours.
I saw tricycles and colored pots with flowers bulging and overflowing.
It looked like a place where things would grow.

After I heard about the fire I drove by and stopped my car.
I wanted to make sure that it was true;
that all of it was gone.
It was.
Not a structure was standing.
It was flat and black.
There was a wood-fire smell; a good smell.

The land hadn't belonged to me in over thirty years.
I couldn't get out and walk the ground.
I wanted to sift my hands through the black ash to see if anything showed,
but it didn't.

I sat in my car and imagined myself looking through the windows,
one room at a time.
It was night and every room was filled with candles.
Even the porch swing was filled with candles, the altar kind.
I watched a flame crawl over a glass wall to sit on the wood.
All the flames began to crawl.
In the flames I saw Judi and me flickering.
In the flames I heard Judi and me crackling,
 sitting and talking and wondering how to live.
I ran around the side and looked in the front bedroom;
at times it was mine.
The bed was filled with candles, the altar kind.
I watched a flame crawl over a glass wall to get under the covers.
All the flames began to crawl.
In the flames I saw me flickering.
In the flames I heard me crackling,
My head was buried under those covers,
afraid to look out,
afraid of the shadows in the windows.

I ran even quicker to the second bedroom;
at times it was mine.
The windows were filled with candles, the altar kind.
I watched a flame crawl over a glass wall to the window.
All the flames began to crawl.
In the flames I saw me flickering.
In the flames I heard me crackling.
Again my head was buried under those covers,
afraid to look out,
afraid of the faces I saw on the neighbor's house and in the trees.

I raced from window to window watching the crawling flames light up the house.
I saved the back room for last.
It was hard to see in.
It was such a secretive room;
this room where I learned to hold my breath,
to be so still that all that was alive in me crawled to a tiny cave in the center of my being.
I began to see just the tiniest glow at first coming from the big stuffed chair.
From there the fire spread.
It caught one thing after another.
It made such a light
my eyes were burned open.
I could see everything.
Nothing was hidden.
Nothing was secret.
I watched it all burn to the ground in my imaginings.
I watched it all change from just a thing to a flame,
to ash that joined the dirt,
and went deep into the ground,
mixing with all that was rotten and fetid, dark and dank,
metamorphing and riching all it touched.
I felt aliveness moving, crawling, filling my body.
I took a breath as deep as the world-
I was morphed,
I was riched.
The house I grew up in burned to the ground
and I am glad.

Janet Ruffin is an artist, writer, and educator.