Dave Bonta's short poem imagines a forest fire as a creature with a mouth, arriving suddenly to feed. It "comes to eat the bark" and takes everything, yet does so "with the greatest meekness." That phrase is the surprise. We expect violence, but the fire behaves like a polite guest at a table, quiet and almost humble while it consumes the whole forest.
The ending sharpens the strangeness. After "supper," the fire is "as thin as ever." It has swallowed everything and gained nothing, as though its hunger can never be filled. The speaker doesn't seem to panic or mourn out loud. Instead, the tone is calm, observant, even a little wry, which makes the destruction feel more unsettling.
The mood is hushed and eerie. By turning disaster into a meal, the poem makes nature's force seem both ordinary and impossible to satisfy.