with a line from Li-Young Lee
What are mountains
but lichen-backed
rocks, crevassed blue
flocks? I made
it back to you,
howling pack, flat
capped jacks, thrust
up bottle caps,
blades. Come, smooth
others, rough sisters;
like a jay cranes
his beak to the tree line,
I’m farther in than
I’ve ever been. In the fog,
a stand of pines—
mulched sculptures
divined on their sides.
This scream at your crags
divides to a track,
a seam I itch
to rumble through;
lead seven, you pull
the blue, mouth
the breeze, grab me.
Listen to this poem:
(previously published in Sugar House Review)
Photo by David Olimpio
