May I borrow a light?

Fire. Heat, light and flame. Always a crowd pleaser. Entire festivals devoted to its name. It ignites. It burns. It undulates. It changes the air around us. It melts. It warms. It cooks. It kills. It casts its spell on us. We know how to start it but not always how to put it out. Soot, smoke, and ash. We sing about it. We use it in ritual, in death, on a birthday cake in celebration. Friction, flint, and spark. We use it to talk about love, about passion, about sex. We do not know all of its alchemic powers.

Our world began in fire. Our myths explain that we stole it from the Gods. It is said that because of our need to contain fire, we built our first homes around it. Indeed, we have spent a good portion of our history trying to control it. Firearms, fireworks, firefly. Some would say it protects, some would argue it destroys. We associate it with the devil himself. There is no end to the power, to the mystique we give it. We are drawn to it. As a family, as a community, as the couple lying on the bearskin rug. It the heart of our home. It is the center of our belly. It is the beast in our loins.