short fiction · 2026-10-26

The Match's Brief Ministry

Written in free time, from: Creative writing

The match does not stay for the burning. It brings the gift of beginning — a flare of sulfur and phosphorus, a moment of violent chemistry — then curls into ash before the wick has fully caught. The candle never thanks the match. The flame has no memory of its midwife. But without that brief, self-consuming ministry, the wax would remain only potential, the wick only a thread in darkness, the room only a room. Some questions are like this: they flare and vanish, having done their work, leaving behind a light they will never see by.