The Fire that Consumes All before It

                                                the fire that birthed the first fire
the fire that stretched its infinite limbs to
touch another fire and another the greedy hungry fire
that swallowed fire whole the self-immolating fire the fire that ate the fire       *black
that died in the fire the fire that wrapped itself around a fire it loved the fire  *bloodbl
that escaped the fire unscathed the anger of fire screaming fire out the door    *ackbloodb
the fire that rages at the moon in its madness the fire betrayed by  *loodblackbloodbl
the immensity of the sun molten bile sour in its belly the melt and *oodblackbloodblackb
drip the black blood fire flooding from the bath a slash of fire red  *lackbloodblac
painting a likeness of fire the only message of which is fire once fire *kbloodblackblood
lived in a house on fire where fire dreamed itself a glowing ghost ship on   *blackbloo
fire sails of fire snapping over fire-black waves of a furious    *dblackblood
ancient sea * weeping ashes weeping *  arias
of fire   * ashes weeping ashes weep *  fanning
auguries * ashes blood weeping black   * of             abject
*                                  depths
of fire  *                      *
drowning                     whole  beneath            night’s             primal              cataclysmic            fire

  b*  l*                           a*
    o*                                                        w*
s*
 o*         h*                                              e*
    e*
e*        s*
    d*                                                        p*

     b*
 l*                                 i*
a*                    n*
              g*
c*
 k*

—after Cy Twombly’s The Fire that Consumes All before It from Fifty Days at Iliam
    https://philamuseum.org/collection/object/85714

Susan Cronin

Susan Cronin earned an MFA in poetry from The New School, and she is an alum of the Kenyon Review Summer Writing Workshop, the Community of Writers Poetry Program, the Tin House Summer Workshop, and the Juniper Summer Writing Institute. Her poems have appeared in journals including The Orange & Bee, Blood Tree Literature, Qu, Pine Hills Review, Crow & Cross Keys, Tinderbox Poetry Journal, Southwest Review (2022 Elizabeth Matchett Stover Award), and A-Minor.