The Way the Story Ended

I struck the first match
when thunder cracked
me apart. I crouched
in a corner of my stomach,
squeezed tight against
a cyclone of inevitable
gravity.

Grandmother returned then
ten years dead, but unchanged,
to steady her cloudy eyes
on my blind mountain
of pain: the dawn of my son.

His damp little palm
grasped the crooked shadow
of her fingers until
every ghost curled
from his ancient gaze,
even those I never knew
wavered in smokey memories
I don't have. Ashes
sixty years old scattered
a benediction of comfort
before the flame died.

I waited frozen years
of solitude until
I lit the second match.

I burned the house down.

This isn't a fairy tale.
I wasn't a snow queen
or a gingerbread witch
although the boy and girl
could not escape.

I did

stumbling
from the icy forest,
leaving everything behind
but a trail of breadcrumbs,
too scared to look back
at the crashing trees.

There are no matches left.
My flash of fury is banked
in a void where snow is falling,
falling and I can't
understand why I feel so warm,
cosseted in ever after, melted
on the tin soldier's heart.