The Shuddering Mountain

Ceaseless noise, an extreme pounding, filters sluggishly, and gradually the peace arrives like the warmth of the day creeping slowly upon my awareness. I sit with eyes closed to the world I know, the world that chaffs and screams eviscerating within my very soul; who stole the sunlight of tomorrow, what happened to the gleam of today? At the edge, the rocky shore beckons as polluted streams course in reminders of yesterdays forever gone, forever the dream unattainable, forever the broken promise we make to ourselves as tender youth; who knew fulfillment stood on the edge of selfish and uneducated points of left or right, up or down, progress or slow death?

I smile, but I’m in shock, noticing the soft, folding landscape of you, the creased and worn tourist magazine I’ve leafed through a million times, never knowing the smell of the forests or the chill of the air. Another mind-numbing television show, empty digital calories feeding me with false excitement and the lustful urge to buy, I want to consume you. I want to stand silent and alone in mad turmoil as I absorb every tendril of your essence.

I am the shuddering mountain of slab and crevasse, weathered and exposed before this wind designed to mirror the hollowness of my every desire. I stand before you bruised by neglect and the crime of too many revolutions, still believing in the faith I found in hazy childhood archetypes, memories now colored with idealism and forgotten toil. Is it any wonder I utter your name as if a sinner prostrate before his god? Can salvation only come to those who have given up all hope? Or will I die a martyr for never outgrowing the devout tingle that glory is just behind the barrier of your permission?