I am attaching a trigger warning here. This poem is about witnessing a death under horrible circumstances. All too often such deaths are afterward referred to as part of a generalised experience that denies the raw truth of severe witness trauma. A truth that is embedded not just in loss, but also in living with the graphic detail.

I remember that awful December, when bushfire turned our world to cinder.
Ah yes, I remember,
I saw her surrounded by brilliant embers, 
alight on the burning grass.
With shaded eyes I approached her,
willing the fire to pass.
But her eyes repelled me as she was torched,
boiling as she screamed.
I saw them dripping,
down scorched cheeks they streamed
in streaks 
that never made it to the ground.
Only then did she fall. 
Only smoke for a pall. 
Never again to be around. 

God bless my daughter.
I’ll never forget her. 
To her spirit I remain 
eternally bound.