laura

 

春拾秋残暮林茫
薄雨难熄炽焰旺
青烟步云乌灰散
灼风扑面胭脂妆
星花迸放暴脆响
炭焦熏烤烟草香
一罐浊酒轻润嗓
余火星辉晩茶凉

At 3:45pm, the bell finally rang, marking the end of the extended school day. Carrying two chicken drums made during the Chinese cooking class during period 9/10, I hurriedly headed to the school parking lot. The day was rainy and dragging. Pulling into the driveway by the house, I saw a thick cloud of gray smock rising over the tree tops and slowly merging into the light blue sky.  Stepping out of the car, a burning scent, sweet and scorching, filled up my nose. A long fresh green water hose lying lazily cross the green field all the way from the water faucet on the northern side of the house to the burning pile near the edge of the woods. Next by the fire, stood a man, muddy and drained, holding the long handle of a fork and keeping adding dead branches into the burning pile. Stepping cross the wet grass in the drizzling rain, I handed him the chicken drums, which were still warm. He swallowed them in seconds, murmuring how tasty they were.  He has been outside in the shower burning since that morning and did not dare to leave the burning scene. He must be starving!

The house is located on a piece of 2- acre land. Behind the woods, there is a tiny stream. During the rainy season, the land near the stream is always flooded.  After a heavy rainfall, the low land will be over-floated with accumulated rain water like a little pond.  With the poor drainage, some of the trees are dying gradually due to the excessive moisture. Every year, we have to clean the woods, cutting off dead branches and trees,  and burn them to keep the area neat and clean. The residents in Easton are allowed to burn during the month from Jan. to May 1^st, if weather permits.

That Wednesday was our last chance to burn this year. The day before Wednesday, Tim chopped down some dead branches during the day and we dragped them into a pile for the next day’s burning. Some of the tree trunks were heavy and it took two of us together to move them. We walked in the woods, dragged and collecting long after the sunset. The woods were getting darker while the pile was getting higher, looking like a giant monster struck out into the deserted darkness.

After almost a day’s burning, the pile was almost gone. The dead trunks and branches were "cremated" and reduced into a pile of black charcoals and ashes. At times the fire was intense, glowing with orange-red flames and fluctuating up and down, oscillating scalding air onto our hands and faces. Sparks splashed in all directions, with crashing sounds and  dark smokes.

While Tim was watching the fire, I fed the dogs and fixed the dinner. Tim finally finished the burning. It was dark now. Watching through the kitchen window, in the distance I saw the remain of the fire like a shiny red star in the woods. The air was cool, the woods was dark and the night was quiet. That  red star became dimmer and dimmer, until it disappeared.  The burning was finally over.