Smoke from a distant fire

There is a song from back in the day about betrayal and lost love with these lyrics: “Your eyes have a mist from the smoke of a distant fire.” I was thinking of that song when I was out weeding the garden. Our skies have been hazy this week, and the air this morning smelled faintly of smoke. Huge fires burning out of control in Oregon and other places west have generated smoke plumes that have travelled the width of the country, blown on easterly winds all the way to us. We are breathing the ashes of dead trees 3000 miles away. We are breathing the effects of climate change. Our eyes have the mist from the smoke of a distant fire, but those distant fires are not so distant after all.