The Burn

Stalks crackled where cars threaded the slow-burn. Straw, insect legs and fumes got into the lungs of trucks, made them talk backwards like the devil on Sundays. Long dead farmers leave their tractors, run across the highway into abandoned barns. Eventually the fire ate itself. Hay wisps floated away into forgetfulness. No one burns the stubble now, but the smoke can be seen moving still under the corn where the devil sullenly forks over long-blackened reeks.