We set torches to ignite the fields. 
My final boot-steps among baled wheat straw.  
Shadow season's harvest and healing – toil 
to be settled now, levied beyond day's strewn light.  

No stalk evades winter work's long shadows.  
Colliding rabbits bounce through smoke-swirl.
Frantic crows scuttle, join owls in the forest 
as I burn our communal mother.  

Airborne embers link with stars, disjointed
phantoms in this weary night jurisdiction.  
Evening breeze snuffs my task. Sundown, 
each day's fierce end, reminds shadows to make amends.

Next autumn's equinox, we will reinvent the fire – 
whether by match or candle. For moonlit flicker 
to bless us as we ignite stalks and silhouettes
For now, before my fieldstone hearth, I rock 

and thaw washed callouses. Boots crust-over at the door.
Fire generates my seasonal prayer to idle gods – prove 
torch's bond and reward with vigorous fruit,
and teach beasts to ready themselves. Clouds deliver 
cold rain this morrow to dowse any undecided blaze.