She was gone and the coldness of it was her final gift. — Cormac McCarthy

You have to carry the fire.

I don't know how to.

Yes, you do.

Is the fire real? The fire?

Yes it is.

Where is it? I don't know where it is.

Yes you do. It's inside you. It always was there. I can see it.

Once there were brook trout in the streams in the mountains. You could see them standing in the amber current where the white edges of their fins wimpled softly in the flow. They smelled of moss in your hand. Polished and muscular and torsional. On their backs were vermiculate patterns that were maps of the world in its becoming. Maps and mazes. Of a thing which could not be put back. Not be made right again. In the deep glens where they lived all things were older than man and they hummed of mystery.

Do you remember that little boy, Papa?

Yes. I remember him.

Do you think that he’s all right that little boy?

Oh yes. I think he’s all right.

Do you think he was lost?

No. I don't think he was lost.

I’m scared that he was lost.

I think he’s all right.

But who will find him if he’s lost? Who will find the little boy?

Goodness will find the little boy. It always has. It will again.