Fire Dancing in the Dust
Black Rock City, Burning Man 2009

Thick dust storm for hours
Burning Man, third year
I’m separated from my fire conclave
unsure if we’ll be performing
I try to ride to them, my fire fans balanced on the front of my bike
Poi on top
Through the deeply dark dust
So dark that I can’t even see just before me
I feel fear as I don’t know what to do
I simply don’t know what to do





I decide to ride to them again
Dust breaks for an instance and I see the man
Surrounded by hundreds of people and art cars
I petal like a mad woman

Have I missed my performance?

I drop my bike in the crowd
Unsure if I’ll ever find it
Flash my inner circle pass and run into the crowd
Of hundreds of fire dancers
All grouped and ready

Where is my fire conclave?
How to find them?
Is this real?

I see my college love with one of the conclaves
I run up to him and kiss him on the lips
He takes my hand
And we run through hundreds of performers
Until I find mine

I dip my poi into the fuel
And in under 10 minutes
Am performing with hundreds of fire dancers
In front of forty thousand or so humans
All arranged in the circle about us
Before we sit
To watch the man explode and burn.

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