Monday, February 14, 2022

"Boiling heat, summer stench…”

Guest post by Frederick Manfred Simon. 

August 3, 2018

Burning. Time. Land. Light. EWG is on the move and hogger Zachary Hastings has a firm set applied; pinching 456 wheels wanting to roll on half as many axles. Hastings having transitioned the three D’s to digging-in dynamics – that lonely reedy-whine tells – upon cresting at Hanson two poles past, now just west of Almira occupying Starkel’s dust-parched dirt road in a near 1.3% slope sloping down to 1.5%. 8,000 tons bunched: fifty-five filled steel railed wagons plus two TILX tanks black bringing up the rear empty, flashing Fred hanging, pushing. This annum’s infernos west belch rising smog high up, blotting out – in seconds – a blood-red black hole sun sinking. Foreground, stubbled. Thickened whisker-waves of amber shaven combine-close attests harvest is in highest gear, confirmed by that permeating, so distinctive powdery, wheat-sweet harvest-time odor commingling this pungent scent of scorched earth, with exhausted, burnt diesel-heated fumes whirling grit altogether swirl, assailing olfactories and searing every eye including Heaven’s all-seeing eye.


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