dream of ember, dream of star

It felt like it took a long time to write dream of ember, dream of star. I first started work on it in 2019, but as the 2020 premiere approached, the COVID-19 pandemic canceled the premiere, and I stepped away from writing for a while. It was rescheduled for 2021 and then canceled again, and I found myself in the strange position of having unfinished material that I had written in what felt like a lifetime ago. Each piece I write is a snapshot of who I am and what I am feeling at that particular moment in my life, and so many things had happened in those long months that I felt different, changed. I found that I could not finish the piece I had started writing almost two years earlier. I restarted. dream of ember, dream of star is not what I set out to write two years ago, and it comes from a place emotionally that I do not know how to adequately describe with words. There has been so much fear, so much loss, so much change, so much division, so many different challenges and experiences -- for some I imagine it must seem like an entire lifetime's worth of loss has been compressed into relatively a short time span. But this experience has also brought some things into clearer focus -- a nascent hope and joy emerging from the pause -- the silence --helping us to discover what is truly important. My hope is that this piece might create a space to reflect. For me, I have been drawn to a recurring image of fire and stars -- the warm glow of a campfire under a cold, deep blue sky and twinkling stars -- both emanating light but separated by billions of miles and many years, felt and warm and visible to me right here and now.