MISUNDERSTOOD FIRE

 

Fire, most misunderstood element

We like when it cooks our food

Warms our homes and baths

Encourages campfire ghost stories

 

Fear of fire, and rightly so, is

Uncontrolled conflagrations

Loss of life and possessions

Scarring from accidents

Raging fever in the body

Yet without Fire--

The Gift from Prometheus

Punished by Zeus

For sharing his knowledge

With mere mortals—

The evolution of humanity

Would not have been possible

 

Science has now realized that

Fever augments the

Performance of immune cells

Providing defense 

Inducing stress on pathogens

Fever almost always

Burns out an infection*

 

But in early times

Fever was seen to devastate

Beloved family members

Patients misunderstood the fever source

Believing the cause is the infection

When, in reality, it is

The body’s response to infection

 

Perhaps this is why

The Ancients

Saw Fire as a Spiritual Element

A mystery in itself

Because our bodies also burn

With a passion for knowledge

Lightning bolts that jolt

As we seek the answer to

Why we are here…

 

© 2024 Clarissa Simmens (ViataMaja)

IMAGE: Fire Poppet in Progress by Micah Rosen

 

*Let Fever Do Its Job, Sylwia Wrotek, et al