I always wear cotton
just in case Emily needs me
to go up in flames. 

I get to be the one that holds
her fire!  How tender
of her to choose me 

from the crashing to burn
just enough for her to lead
our children to safety.

How terrible it must be for a man 
to have less of a purpose 
than to be burned like me.

originally appeared in Hotel Amerika

Darren C. Demaree is the author of eleven poetry collections, most recently “Emily As Sometimes the Forest Wants the Fire”, (June 2019, Harpoon Books). He is the recipient of a 2018 Ohio Arts Council Individual Excellence Award, the Louis Bogan Award from Trio House Press, and the Nancy Dew Taylor Award from Emrys Journal. He is the Managing Editor of the Best of the Net Anthology and Ovenbird Poetry. He is currently living in Columbus, Ohio with his wife and children.