Birch Bay writer and poet Julie Hanft shares a poem.
Her new book, “A Breath,” is expected to be published in fall. Hanft says it is about the unique life and love story she shared with her husband.
The Wildfire of Me
Beneath the surface,
Ghosts scuttling like embers,
Each breath igniting tales of ash and flame,
Each pulse, a whisper,
Calling forth the wildness,
The tempest of spirits locked in the vault of my flesh.
Here lies the rebel,
Sinew and bone calling out,
Echoes of life unfurling with wings,
Unruly, raw,
Author of chaos,
She burns with a promise,
A hunger for the horizon,
For the fierce embrace of wide-open skies.
Another dwells deeper,
A shadow filled with secrecy,
Fragile yet fierce,
Dancing on the edge of my memory,
A flickering firelight in the corridor of my thoughts,
Bearing witness to struggles,
To the way I howl to the moon,
In joyous surrender wrapped in wildness,
A paradox of flame and whisper.
Each ghost stirs,
With every heartbeat,
I am the wildfire, the untamed, the unexpected,
Flirting with danger and delight,
An indomitable spirit woven through the fabric of me.
Voices calling within,
A symphony of passion,
Sometimes abrasive,
Sometimes tender — a relentless dance,
What does it mean to be wild?
To embrace all that is hidden
Underlayers of skin, yearning for release,
For recognition, for understanding.
These ghosts,
They do not haunt;
They inhabit, they ignite,
The forgotten relics of the girl
Who dared to unravel,
To rise,
Into the incandescent blaze of becoming
While reveling in the shadows
That fuels this fire —
The wildfire of me.
