Posted May 1, 2010
(Published in The Antioch Review, Spring 2008, Vol. 66, No. 2)
BURNT
by Karen Hall Siegel
A true story
A winter morning, 2003: Stirring oatmeal, letting Al Roker’s banter distract from my sister-inlaw’s fresh death and my faraway sick mother’s plight, I abruptly glanced over my left shoulder to locate an unfamiliar noise. Wide, high flames were the disturbance—rising from that shoulder and resembling a cartoonist’s hell… sleeve caught fire? no cloth burns that fast...Snapping off the oatmeal burner, I dove from the kitchen and rolled. Rolling, I struggled to untie the belt of my blazing kimono, but bows can turn to knots when you’re rolling.
