Seamus Heaney's poem "The Little Canticles of Asturias," which appeared in the debut issue of Slate, contains a mesmerizing image of a "smouldering maw/ of a pile of newspapers lit long ago," fanning "up in the wind, breaking off and away/ in flame-posies, small airborne fire-ships." Heaney's verse reminded me that everything--even awful newspaper stories--is beautiful when it burns. Such was the inspiration that I embraced "Flame Posies" as the name for my occasional column on the press. I also hope that the oxymoron will remind me to include applause as well as condemnation in my dispatches.