Fire and Ice

The signs of “end of days” continue. Fourth day of ashes on my deck and second day of no kids at school allowed outside—first time in 45 years in San Francisco. A friend is battling bedbugs, my wife planted kale yesterday and rats had eaten it by this morning, raccoons are running on the roof of another friend’s house and causing sleepless nights. A genuine certified madman is driving the mothership, throwing friends and enemies alike out the window (just decided to withdraw from UNESCO yesterday). The apologists keep holding on to “give him a chance” while the finger itches perilously close to the nuclear button. If you think ashes on the deck is a problem, wait until the nuclear fallout starts raining down.

But still we go on. What other choice is there? Look forward to the dinner we’re cooking tonight, get excited about a concert we’ll play tomorrow, sit down at the piano with Bach and feel the height of human intelligence and beauty course through our fingers. The first grader’s gestures for “Oats, Peas, Beans and Barley Grow” make us smile from ear to ear, the chorus singing a South African song brings Spirit into the room, the three-year old who knows all the words to Coming Around the Mountain inspires us.

With the fires still blazing up north and the wild dog of hate let out of its cage in Washington and beyond, I remembered Robert Frost’s epic poem:

                            Some say the world will end in fire.

                            Some say in ice.

                            From what I’ve tasted of desire

                            I hold with those who favor fire.

                           But if it had to perish twice,

                           I think I know enough of hate

                           To say that for destruction ice

                           Is also great

                          And would suffice.

Your choice?