A/N: Challenges:

Diversity Writing Challenge, a9 – between 100-150 word poem
Freeverse Poetry Boot Camp, #004 – ablaze
The Scrabble Challenge, "wait"


Bonfires of War

They weren't waiting around for a bonfire
but that's what they got: trash and treasure
both alight in the black space sky
as though it didn't need to breathe at all,
just burn

And that was what wars did, did they not?
Just burn, feed off the dead and the alive,
feed of metal that's broken apart and fried,
feed of limbs that have bled and died,
feed of memories they can't abide…

And the fire sucks up it all:
that they want to lose,
that they don't.

They wait in a war and they'll get a bonfire
whether they want it or not.