Dance At Winter Solstice
As intended, I made a fire at nightfall on the winter solstice. The family left the warmth of the house to see the fire that by itself cut the frost of the night. I made the fire as a memorial of sorts for those 
who might have been with us, my parents, the grandmother who raised me, and a sister two years younger than I. A few friends too, were present in my mind with those related by blood.
Who stands by a fire without being fascinated by the sparks that are elevated by the swirling updraft of hot air, – solid wood — transubstantiated into lighter-than-air mixture of gases, and ash? Who of our ancestors did not gaze into such a fire, feeling such a 
present (presence) as I now feel? My wife joined me, our youngest daughter and her wife, and a grand daughter now five years old.
The sparks ascend and I remember my mother and father. I’ve never understood my relationship to them, and I have imagined what might have been. An alternate past would have meant entirely another present and by implication a future which will not be. But, I am here, in this present.
The words from the T. S. Eliot’s poem East Coker seem apt for moments standing outside in winter, by a fire.
Time present and time past
Are both perhaps present in time future,
And time future contained in time past.
If all time is eternally present
All time is unredeemable.
What might have been is an abstraction
Remaining a perpetual possibility
Only in a world of speculation.
What might have been and what has been
Point to one end, which is always present.
and…
At the still point of the turning world. Neither flesh nor fleshless;
Neither from nor towards; at the still point, there the dance is,
But neither arrest nor movement. And do not call it fixity,
Where past and future are gathered. Neither movement from nor towards,
Neither ascent nor decline. Except for the point, the still point,
There would be no dance, and there is only the dance.
I can only say, there we have been: but I cannot say where.
And I cannot say, how long, for that is to place it in time.
2 thoughts on “Dance At Winter Solstice”
I’m always a bit hesitant to add my past work that I somehow feel relates to your wonderful blog and yet that uncertainty never seems to stop me. So here goes:
Echoes
When winter’s icy hand extends
beneath solid shuttered doors,
the brick hearth beckons.
A match, a flicker, and fire takes hold.
For a moment, heat triumphs,
and we utter the collective sigh.
It is on these grave-black nights,
as we gather before fire’s sacred light,
the phantoms commence to dance
at the corner of my eye,
swirl, twist, then disappear
into a netherworld of smoke.
Staring deeper into the fire,
half-imagined fragments manifest
from a past revived in twinges.
A past where consciousness flirts with
long dormant instincts sparking
like so many glowing embers.
Do these ethereal images emanate
from stories told ‘round ancient campfires,
plucked from unremembered memories
buried deep in a psyche overwhelmed
by a world positing rational thought
over the shaman’s nighttime tale?
At last the evening coals fade,
leaving ambiguous familiarity,
an essence, revealing itself,
not in ashes, but in helix strands
of seeds sewn by forgotten ancestors
who now walk only in my dreams.
Your poem exactly parallels my sense. Thanks for offering it.