𝗟𝗜𝗧𝗘𝗥𝗔𝗥𝗬: “Where the Fire Feels Like Home” by Khim Lhady May Galasinao

 

Published by: Kristine Caye Emono

Date Published: April 23, 2025

Time Published: 3:50 PM

Category: Prose

Theme: The willingness to risk everything for a love that makes you feel at ease, even if it means that you'll fall and get hurt at the end.

I have spent my life searching for a home that does not crumble beneath my touch—one not built from anger and heavy footsteps. But every door I open reveals only emptiness, and every roof I stand beneath feels like a prison. I am weary of existence, exhausted by the weight of my own breath.

And then there is you.

A house set ablaze, a ruin that does not beg to be saved. You burn reckless, unyielding—and I am drawn to the glow like something starved for warmth. I do not fear the fire. I want to step into it, to let it strip away everything that has made me cold. 

If I must be undone, let it be in your light. 

If I must disappear, let it be in the only place that ever felt like home.

But homes are not meant to last. Fires do not burn forever. And as I stand at your threshold, I wonder. Am I meant to survive you, or was I always destined to become part of the ash you leave behind?

Still, I step forward, drawn by the heat—knowing it will hurt, yet willing to bear the burn. Love has never been kind to me. Always fleeting, always slipping through my fingers like sand. But you—you are different. 

You are not a love that fades into the background, not a quiet whisper or a gentle touch. You are wildfire—consuming. And perhaps that is why I want you.

Inside your flames, there is no room for hesitation. No space for the fear that has kept me wandering, searching for shelter in places never meant to hold me. You are not safe, but you are real. And for once, I do not want safety. I want to be ruined by something worth the fall.

So I step into you, knowing I will never walk away the same. My skin may blister, my breath may catch in the smoke of us, but I do not care. I would rather be scorched by love than spend another lifetime in the cold.

If I must burn, then let me burn for you.

If I must be reduced to ash, let it be in the arms of the only thing that ever felt like home.