—from Cobb, California to Trinidad, California

The surround of pines I like to write about—those ever-beauties, slight scent clean in constant seasons, their wash of whispers like gossip about green, a capable space for ravens and woodpeckers and jays, my buoyant brethren along the sheltering ridge—is gone, engulfed in marching heat, malefic flame, gone in the Valley Fire, a local label for fearsome life, for the force that felled the lodgepoles, opened like last gifts their hardy scatter of cones.

§

We were returning from surgery, the dog’s wormy wart removed, teeth cleaned. Our plan for the afternoon was petting rest for him and you, work for me. When we arrived at my house, a plume was rising—a special effect on the loose, doom hugely feathering, a signal to the normal: done, done, done. We dashed to the deck and watched the valley go up. Helicopters zoned the spinning wind. Embers branded land with a new owner. Disaster strafed the darkening day, and the sun hid behind.

§

Freebie was my cat of a few months, a stray who’d adopted me, wild, a wanderer, independent but delighted to be fed, sheltered, loved. I hadn’t bought a cat carrier yet, and in the evacuation she slunk in a panicked circle from dashboard to back seat, dashboard to back seat, panting. Parking at your house to finish packing, I left a window open an inch or two so she could breathe. Where did my fierce, mysterious girl go; where is she amidst the mayhem, hunting and hunted in the fire-haunted nights, hissing at the calico finalities of trees?

§

Its first hours devoured a village. Early evening it drove the mountain a mile a minute, leveled most of Middletown. The bones of the tardy were incinerated. Years of drought and disease ripened flames; last week’s heat in the hundreds set the terrible table; pure appetite wolfed the swaying offerings of fuel.

§

I write by a hand I harry to stable paper, the ruined, reconstituted bodies of beings; I write on remains. I create with the gift of energy, encircled by light, like a tree’s seed by rings; like light, like a day, I decline, I die.

§

The trail is wet after yesterday’s rain, and fallen leaves sprinkle it like spice. The ocean is throaty, fresh, restoring, life’s formula. I’m a “mandatory” evacuee, fleeing catastrophe, arriving at the established kindness of friends. Redwoods remind me of patience. Wildflowers wink by my side. Queen Anne’s Lace offers her wardrobe to the mill of the fall.

§

Seabirds call from a sea stack, a stunning stone, set in tides, married to time, waves playing around its fatherly contours, its carved authority. A bit up the cliff four women click a selfie and cheer. Foam crawls and sprints and razzles in the roar. And I array more: the clouds crowning the horizon; the sun like the seal of arrant sustenance; this set of pebbles in a little pool. They gleam as if made to decorate today, to seduce easy eyes needy for beauty. And they do. For now they do.

Bio: Bill Gottlieb