Smoke

I light a stick of caked-on fuel, just to see it burn. The thin swirls of white smoke start unevenly, a tell-tale clue of my faulty kindling. It rises perfectly, flattens a mid-way up, slows cools and falls. It clings to the lampshade, an adhering ghost, a flying soul lonely and dying.

Then sense is swept into me by the thought of mortality. By clinging to the light, it becomes the most visible. There is smoke all around me, invisible, clear and discreet. I trace the life of a short segment. Up and up, following the line. It begins to stutter, losing that passion that is red hot below. It is only pushed now but what's under it, and what's beside it. Stagnant shades and curves of white smoothly dissolve into the dim evening light. And the cycle continues until all of the powdered grit has been devoured by the smolder into a gray snake of dust.

The smell is what captivated me at first, of course, but scents are too easily drowned out, accepted and ignored. Taken for granted, dissolved into our ever-lasting consciousness. I am like the smoke, here until I am not, then I'm gone; or am I? For it doesn't REALLY disappear, it simply becomes uninteresting to the human eye, and is invisible.

But it illustrates a point. By being graced with color and velocity, this beautiful air provides a striking glance into a mostly invisible, underrated fluid. like an upside-down drop of coloring into clear water, the smoke gently circles and disperses in a beautiful display of grace. To think, that in the room, such ballads and waltzes surround me. But not only me, but all who live. The smoke simply provides insightful contrast for us to perceive.

I blow now into the cloud of swirls...and in the depth of mist, a hole widens. Then snaps closed. And in the sphere of speedy chaos the assimilation of smoke into air accelerates, and smoke disappears. And yet it continues in it's slow, winding tale, my interference dismissed casually. Linearly forcing a boundless object such as this will only end in frustration. I cannot grasp it, it slips through my fingers like a passing dream. I cannot hold it, only pray that my presence before it disturb not it's song.

It tells a story, this stick, of two brothers in their life... I cannot interpret it quickly enough, the performance was too technically stunning for me to find meaning in the message. And a chord struck in my heart wishes to reevaluate, to rewind and start over, but I have gained so much already.

This stick is unique and irreplaceable; the setting, unrepeatable.

This kind column of smoke shows us what is always here, in us as we breathe, this wonderful soft fluid that is our atmosphere. A door to the invisible, a map of the untraceable, it enables us to see patterns and appreciate the hidden. Fascinatingly simple, this demonstration of common fluid laws. A treat for thoughtful eyes.

I like smoke.  I suppose that makes me a smoke watcher.