Please Just Tell Us To Go

May 2011 Slave Lake, Alberta

Thousands of northern Albertans wait for the news

Are we safe?

Should we go?

They listen to the radio.
The TV.
Social Media.

No one tells them to go.

The flames lick the edges of their town and immediately they’re in their cars and trucks frantic to get out of town.
Trapped, every road a wall of flame.
They wait in parking lots till the road clears, escaping with nothing but their lives.
They have nothing.
They would have packed their treasures.
If only someone had told them to go.
Terrified their neighbours have not been so lucky.

Days later.
Volunteers search the charred remains
Will they find  bodies?
They are sure they will.
But they don’t.
A miracle.

November 2018

Next time.
And there will be a next time.

Please

Please just tell us to go.

Because we would rather wait a million years in a parking lot surrounded
By flames
Than search ashen basements for bodies
Bodies of friends and families who waited
Waited too long to be told

Just go.