I could not see the next summit,
the gashed gnarl of its face.
I guessed only that its steepening
inclines had been set against me.
I could hear all the echoings
of the dead in their ice-tombs
where their aims had led them
and buried them, then, deeper,
the incredible footfall
of sherpas, spirited, light
and deft, unbetraying. A silence
stretched on toward a night
long with unhuman testimony.
Then it came: the world-clearing
hammer-blows of distant avalanches,
the palpitations of chaos,
one whiteout of potentiality.
My tent fluttered and gripped
at the snow that stored for spring
all paths to the peak, leading
through veils of embraces,
inconsolable losses, charms,
fantastic indictments. Swelling
its stormfront, then collapsing
into a voice like winter, the wind
took up a human song and broke
across the horizons. It sang,
'You are an unborn fjord,
a chasm yet to be. Only water
sculpts its beauty: let it pass.
Throw no harness over the clouds,
they hold no secrets, but are.
Here, while you plan your ascent
each night, exalting the fey,
the indolent, the totemic, you are
like a thief on a watchtower.
Until every such night has passed
you will light, tend, and watch die
a small, tense fire, but awake
surrounded by footprints.'
