There is a lantern in the window of a house at the edge of the wood, and it was not carved from a pumpkin.
The custom is older than the orange gourd and travelled a long way to get here: a turnip hollowed out with a spoon, a coal from the fire set inside, the face cut crooked because turnips do not cooperate. It burned badly. It smelled like scorched dinner. It was set on the sill facing out.
Not for decoration. For a wanderer — the one who was turned away from both doors, above and below, and given an ember to walk with. He is still walking. He knocks at what is lit.
So you light one, and you leave it, and you go up to bed while the year turns over on the other side of the glass.
