What The Mountain Said
1976
throat of stone bent back
root of granite rising
pine forests, broken rock, flat planes of light
Mountain, risen in a glance
fixed stones twirl me tunneling
in
a thousand feet above
the green tree line
frozen in a half mortal circle
half human
woman
driving this truck
working wheel-brakes-clutch
when this stone alphabet just happens before me
blasting me from numb
made urgent and mute
made absolute
erotic connection crawls up my legs
and I’m stoppin’ this truck
reachin’ for pen, paper, brake
like I can interpret this
to some insensate page
but
it’s hopeless in language
mind crystalizing
body to follow
she is Mountain
incomprehensible before me
but clear as a blessing inside
and I’m listenin’
not letting the moment fade
my eyes have hands that grasp through
into stone
returning to direct heart
chanting geologic voice
magic carpet ride me
on winds of elation
into deep time
I snap my roots
her frozen rising takes me up
she says Look at Me!
sheer crags sprung to granite heights
she says
I am a storm
condensed into edifice
I am fallen
creased from the stars
now you are surrounded
by space and time’s motion
we are hurtling through galaxies
life birthed again
and again in the bulge and thrust
of boulderfields and tap roots
eons reflecting in meadows of water
eagles and wildflowers
shadows condense mineral folds
who’s glints prospect our past
millennial weathers are eating our mass
of gold lodes, wolf packs, glaciers
storms pound our cornices
springs melt our castles to valley lakes
talus slopes avalanching
inside my heart
I am eye level to her mouth
and She is speaking me open
crawl like kinnikinnick out of the crevices
be heart close to earth
drink from taproots in frozen winters
rest deep with mycelia
sending through hyphae
into cerrated evergreens
build beaver dams when tender green comes
like spruce, toss your shining cones skyward
or wait
bare in snow with aspen stalks
silver groves yearning upward
for years
through winter weight
there is patience in knowing
the seasons will change
bearing you around
to this same shadowed circle of stone
the sky dropping down on us
rise up, woman
to feel how
this theater holds all
peaks and valleys
of your life’s strivings
faithful as bees to blooms
and your density amplified now
to adamantine constancy
stone stage curtains
hung with trees
your widening sapient solidity
magnetic polar stationing
corded to moss all the way down
your own magnificent efforts amplified
by the beauty
of it All.
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