On Fire - Nine poems by Michael Cope

On Fire
9 poems by
Michael Cope

Hot

Hot Saturday early evening out with Dave

looking for some girl in the city bowl,

lost in a tangle of sloping streets,

popping VW Beetle, slowing down

around corners to read the signs.

In a garden a fire, some people braaiing,

we’ll ask them if they know the way,

the street. We click-rattle the old

gate-latch open, and when we reach

the stoep an aged man in a gown

staggers, eyes popping, face all lines

of agony, his shed’s ablaze and he’s dying!

We put the fire out, hand the man to the late

fire brigade. Never did locate Dave’s date.


I loved attacking that fire. All the wood

around the door, the back wall and one side

were a horde of young flames eager to strut.

We had the hose. It turned the smoke

to steam. We kicked out the damaged burning

beams. I feared it might light my hair,

got Dave to use the hose to make me wet.

Dripping denim jacket, spraying wide

swathes of water, the jet a cold lance

to the hot little flames, straining not to choke,

we went in and killed it. Then turning

back out, soaked, streaked and gasping air

and laughing, we left just as the fire truck

pulled up. The guy survived, with luck.