Poet / Pilgrim

Baked Mountain Concerto

by Anne Hanley

First Movement: Up

After an endless march across the valley
then a final push halfway up
the backside of Baked Mountain,
he fell into base camp – so exhausted
he doubted his own purpose.
What could he, an artist, see with mere eyes
that all the scientists traveling with him
could not reduce to graphs and data?

But the next day was a new day.
Tip-toeing past the sleeping others,
past his own pack, heavy as sin,
this time taking only his third eye,
he stole from base camp and started up.
This time he seemed to float
over the windblown ash, never sinking
through its rust-red mantle to the snow beneath.
This time, in no time, he found himself
on top of Baked Mountain.

Cadenza : His own/ Inspiration

Looking down on Novarupta,
he could feel the great heart of the world
pulsing blood-hot magma
through all its arteries. He could sense
beneath that giant stopper
the forces of creation and destruction
sleeping like babies in each other’s arms.
He watched the way the Magi must have watched
hovering over the manger, awed, abashed,
delighted, hypnotized by the raw potential.
Then he heard himself singing himself a lullaby,
“Everything that ever was, still is;
or is waiting to be born again.”
He felt whole and suddenly hungry.
He turned around.