Angry all-consuming red tongues,

Licking up the blazing brick barrier

my heart as numb as a sunflower

 in a frigid winter frost.

And those brilliant blooming azaleas

Blackened, shattered, same as the windows.

Same as my heart.

Oops. A single tear escapes, falling, burning, hissing

At the craving azaleas.

The house engulfed, a flaming red inferno;

Hair sticking, sweaty, clammy.

But the azaleas, wilting, pleading,

Insisting upon me.

The roof hurtles, falling,

gracefully, so gracefully

To meet the screaming azaleas.

Come, come, they jeer.

I jump to the inferno, the azaleas;

The shrieking azaleas.

My poor weeping azaleas.