Lignite by Andrew McCallum Crawford

You dig it up.

It’s been buried for years –
millions of them.
It used to be trees.
They must have been beautiful.

You burn it.

The smoke makes patterns.
Dark blue on sky blue.
People see things.
Beautiful things.
Some people

claim to see trees.

Others stare into the ashes

Trying to rekindle the memory
Of a moment’s warmth.

Andrew McCallum Crawford, Scotland