Just over the summit when he could look down

at the lower valleys,

when he had to brake to concentrate

on navigating the hairpin turns,

he began to weep over the steering wheel

of his small, battered car,

not knowing why he was weeping,

only that a wrong –

large and profound as

the huge boulders on cliffs

and embankments hovering above him –

still loomed

 

Tears fogging his eyeglasses

he bounced off ruts into a turnaround,

side casting dust and gravel,

braked again, shouldered open the door,

stood with elbows on the roof of the car,

jaws held and centered by his hands,

weeping until he cried himself clear,

and could view the vastness

of evergreen, aspen, stone and stream,

the depth of the gorge,

could see from above

the incomprehensible history of the world

 

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