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Thursday, December 4, 2014

Fire in the night

Fire in the night

By May Kwek

It was a perfectly ordinary evening
That faded to a perfectly ordinary night
Inside some were sleeping
Or reading by the lamp light

Then there came a perculiar smell
That we couldn’t quite place
It smelled to me like incense
But there was none in this place

In vain we searched
All around the room
Then turned to the window and found
Smoke obscuring the moon

Dimly we seemed to hear
The calls of “Fire!”
So we left our home quickly
To see what was the matter

But when we reached the lowest floor
It was a horror that we found
Flames that blazed out like a serpent’s tongue
Hell on earth not underground

Like a river of flames
It gushed out from the window
Flickering, leaping
As the frame melted and broke

And fell glowing red
On to the ground
Oh how some screamed
At that sight and sound

Rising ever higher 
The flames vaporised to smoke
As black as the night that surrounded it
To choke out any hope

Then some sank like whispers
Closer to the ground
And I felt the heat of the fire
Though I was seven floors down

And around me a hoard had gathered
And we stared and stared
Others whipped up phones and cameras
And their hopes and fears shared

Little children clung on to their mothers
Their faces drawn with worry and fear
And their mothers knowing without words
Quietly drew them near

And the fire continued to blaze
A bright inferno in the night
And sent down showers of glass and metal
To all watching by its light

It was horrific, beastly and terrible
As was the scar it left
A woman crying silently
At the fire’s theft

Copyright © 2014 by May Kwek

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