The planks were soft as turf beneath my feet;
below, the river held its cold refrain.
You stood the far side, arms at rest. The rot
and sycamore gave way—not flame,
just long damp years of timber finding heat,
sweet with resin, darkened chapel wood
and beeswax, candle-black, now rising free
through leather, through the sole. I understood
just then: I was the fire, burning as I moved,
the elder trees behind me gone to ash,
the bridge engulfed—you watched the soot
and cinder, marked the flaring span
of boards fall one by one into the mist,
your hands already blackened to the wrist.