They are hard to find, the strike anywhere kind
with the white tip you taught me to light
against the zipper of my jeans when I was six.
Once you set our kitchen aflame
hid in the long grass behind our house watching
it blaze, more fascinated than afraid.
Now, in the waltzing glow of my woodstove
I dare a safety match to flare,
flick it with my thumbnail and wonder:
Did your hands shake? Did you drop the box,
scatter matches like pick-up-sticks across the floor
before you fired up that Bunsen burner
and inhaled?