The Burn

Stalks crackle, cars thread the slow-burn. Straw, insect legs and fumes get into the lungs of trucks, make them talk backwards like the devil on Sundays. Bygone and by-passed farmers leave their tractors, run across the highway into abandoned barns. Eventually the fire eats itself - hay wisps float away into forgetfulness. No one burns corn stubble now, but the smoke can be seen moving beneath the sunbaked sod where ghosts still sullenly fork-over long-blackened reeks.