This is another example of prose poetry. The poem owes its origins to real events that occurred during an Australian summer when I was a teenager. It is strange to be recalling a summertime event in the middle of an Australian winter, but it was an unforgettable time and it often resurfaces, particularly when I revisit my old home town.
During that long ago summer, a string of hot summer days -a heat wave was ours to endure. A summer that left the landscape parched and dry and communities exposed to the potential of devastating bush fires. And so it transpired...
The poem is presented in two stanzas; blocks of texts representing the before and after aspects of the event.
A Summer Blaze
During my fourteenth summer a January bushfire tried to erase our small town. It poked its flaming head above the ridge line, consumed a pine plantation then down the slope it raced, hot and voracious. Acrid smoke surrounded our homes, our streets, our every tiny space. Live embers fell about our feet like death stars, threatening to open new fire fronts. Every road out of town breached by walls of fire.
No escape, turn back now. Evacuation points for everyone, the local football ground where we gathered in hope of a miracle while the fire continued its relentless advance. Salvation arrived in the early hours of a new morning, delivering showers, averting disaster providing relief to a scorched landscape and a fortunate town. Summertime miracle. Smoke, cinders and dampness greeted the new day. Our little town had been spared.
Alan j Wright
Alan, your prose poem made a wonderful story with vivid language and imagery. It kept my attention throughout the poem. The ending lines brought the news of a summertime miracle.
ReplyDeleteThank you for these generous remarks, Carol. Much appreciated. It was the closest thing to a miracle i have experienced.
DeleteThat gave me chills! What an experience! Summers in Australia seem like an endurance test for every living thing, even the ground itself.
ReplyDeleteEvoking a response from a reader is the writer's reward, Jane, so it pleases me to read your response. Australian summers are indeed a double edged sword. Living on the world's driest continent presents challenges.
DeleteWhat a terrifying experience, Alan! Your word choice and imagery was so compelling and had me racing along to the end. "Live embers fell about our feet like death stars..." Wow!
ReplyDeleteIt was unforgettable, Molly. Thank you for your most considered remarks. I can still recall my dad and I hosing down our house and the garden to discourage a storm of live embers falling from the night sky.
DeleteWow. What a story, what a memory. Your town was lucky that rain intervened.
ReplyDeleteIndeed we were lucky, Mary Lee. That night and the next morning are etched deeply in my memory.
DeleteLyrical yet filled with tension -- Form-wise, it feels like the poet must lean heavily on word choice and sentence length so the prose will carry the reader into the story. "...embers fell about our feet like death stars..." Such vivid imagery! Thank you for sharing both the poem and your memory.
ReplyDeleteThank you for your most kind remarks, Patricia. Such comments drive our continuing efforts as poets.
DeleteWow, Alan, what a terrifying event and a powerful prose poem. It's a fitting form for sharing so much emotion and information in a short piece. The pooem grabbed me in the first lines with the image of the pine plantation being consumed. Horrifying. The rain was beyond fortunate! Thanks for sharing this.
ReplyDeleteThank you Karen. I appreciate your considered response. It was a once in a lifetime experience and after all these years I feel better for having documented it.
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