Every year we gather here to listen to these stories
Like children in the woods huddling around a fire
Looking into the flames for something
A warmth, a companion, a history, an answer
And every year we leave feeling as if we are whole
Only to return again to the fire
Like a kid to camp
Like a moth to the flame
Because one story isn’t every story
The stories we get are never enough
No matter how long we stay by the fire, we shall never be warm
And no matter how long we stare we have yet to find what we are looking for

With each passing year the fire grows dimer
As stories start to disappear with the ones who told them
And we are all left with ashes and embers
Just as they once were
Some people will leave the fire pit, and others will continue staring
And eventually someone will wonder why don’t they get up to collect some firewood
Reignite the pire

We can not just keep expecting someone else to maintain the fire
To keep these stories alive
It falls on each of us sitting around the fire to take our turn in tending it
Protecting it as it naturally grows dimer and as others, determined to forget, come through with buckets of water to extinguish the fire and the lives it contains
Furthermore we should poke and prod at the fire
Not just stare like it’s the forbidden fruit or an animal at the zoo
If we want the answers we are looking for it is not by some miracle going to crawl from the flames or form a picture in the smoke cloud

The answers will be buried deep in the burning coals
And some will be too deep to find until there is no one left to find them
While others are simply too hard to swallow
Traveling down our throats in a trail of fire
Causing us to stutter when we try to utter them

But like those before us we shall speak
Cause every story untold
Every life forgotten
Is not only a lost soul
But a guarantee that history is destined to repeat