We Dance to the Fire

Perhaps it was the fire that first made people dance. Perhaps they were celebrating the purifying of their space when they threw all their bones into it, creating the first bonefire, or bonfire. Perhaps they danced in celebration of the clearing away of the old and the making way for the new.

Fire is still a way to purify our space. We can burn those things we are done with. We can burn those things that are unclean. Wounds can be cauterized with a knife blade heated in fire. Old dressings can be burned in the fire.

Old photos, old letters. old papers that we do not want to keep can be burned in the fire. We dance as they burn, faster, as the flames leap higher, slower as they die down. Once the old photos and papers turn into ashes, what was on them only lives in our memory. When the fire of our spirit dies and energy leaves us, the fire of memory passes to others.

Fire heats stones for saunas and sweats, opening our pores so that we are cleansed by the release of water through our skin.

Fire boils water for bathing, for cooking food, for making tea. We dance when we heal. We dance when we feast. We dance because we can. We dance to connect our energy with the energy of others. We dance to connect with the energy of spirit.

We gather by the bonfire and the fireplace to tell our stories and sing our songs. In the places where we do not have fireplaces or bonfires, we have candles. Our spirits dance by these candles, with romance and softness mingled with the soft glow of the candles, the gentle fragrance, the light that keeps us close.

It is the softness of the skin and the subtle scent of the person, and the pheromones that dance underneath the aura of oils that heat sends sailing toward us on the air, and these invite us to taste the softness we crave, and dance with our tongues.

Friction from our bodies, persistently rubbing together until spirit fire ignites, set us in motion and we dance with the fire. We dance with the fire for as long as it lasts, and when it comes down to a bed of orange embers, we dance on them and walk to the other side. Then we exhale loudly, then softly, and raise the embers into flames, our breath the fuel for the flames. And when the flames dance upon the earth again, we add more wood, and the smoke and the scent of the burning herbs circle our beings. And we cast off everything until there is only us, our skin, glistening in the glow of the fire.

We have broken the spell of everything that does not matter. There is dancing and fire, and the fire creates water, and the water is us, flowing together. And we dance to the rhythm of the fire within.