Lost Time in the Burn Scar, by Taylor Graham
Lost Time in the Burn Scar
Old fire behaviorist, forester and range
manager – teaching how a forest comes back
from fire. But unlike the land, you
can’t come back. I’m walking below a log deck
of burned-dead conifers. I pulled over to see
what’s happening, two years after fire
that turned the ground to ash under skeleton
trees. Now it’s growing green:
coyote mint and thistle, aster, mules ears,
butterweed, ceanothus – which species? you
could tell me if you were here. You could name
all these grasses, too – my plant app
won’t hazard a guess. And elderberry – already
big as a bush in its first year, flowering.
And pollinators! moths, butterflies, bees.
Tiny grasshoppers. Did I think I was alone
here? so many lives moving so fast,
I almost bumped into a butterfly! Two years.
They’re making up for lost time.
for Hatch
-Taylor Graham
![Caldor Burn Progression, 2023, Giclée print, Still from the digital video FIRELAND Whichever Way the Wind Caldor Burn Progression, 2023, Giclée print, Still from the digital video FIRELAND Whichever Way the Wind](https://artsandcultureeldorado.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/Caldor-Burn-Progression-2023-Giclee-print-Still-from-the-digital-video-FIRELAND-Whichever-Way-the-Wind-scaled.jpg)