Returning from the summit when he could
look down at the twisting canyon,
when he needed to brake hard
to hold the hairpin turns,
he began to weep over the steering wheel
of his small, travel worn car,
not knowing why he was weeping,
only that a wrong –
large and profound as
the huge boulders on the cliffs
and embankments jutting below him –
had been committed
Tears spotting his eyeglasses he braked
and skidded into a turnaround,
side casting dust and gravel to a stop,
shouldered open the door,
stood with his elbows on the roof of the car,
jaws held and centered by his hands,
weeping until he cried himself clear
and could overlook the vastness
of evergreen, aspen, stone and stream,
the depth of the gorge,
could see from that view
the incomprehensible history of the earth