"The Mountain"

A poem in many parts, by John Harper

(with permission)

Visit John at,

www.open-secrets.com

 

always the mountain

soaring up from earth

stretching far beyond the eagle's reach

noble aristocrat, Olympian presence

empyrean sovereign bows to none

head high in tempest or tranquility

inspires, reassures

prodigious seduction from afar

and I  

pretender to the throne

emulate such grandiosity

rock solid, I stand aloof

with pretentious dignity

one cool remove away

from the world and its ailment

man - humankind

me

matured beyond the frailties

of youth and innocence

having abandoned the three deadly sins

sensitivity, compassion and consideration

and ripened into the fullness

of human endeavor

thank God!

for the mountain

talisman, totem, mentor

without whose image and presence

to study, to follow, to model

surely would I be

victim, pawn, sacrificial lamb

in some others machinations

 

O! the fortune

the serendipity of the proximity

let others languish and wallow

in treasonous sentiment

and baleful soft-heartedness

childhood's lessons cut to the quick

young and tender

the impressionable fall prey

to familial Darwinism

evolutionary consequence of original sin

visited, imprinted, incorporated

contemporary good intentions

bushwhacked by repressed heredity

but I survive, endure

 

with the mountain's silent council

whose strengths I have adapted

modified for human survival

mine among them

yet, though I sustain an existence

there is an emptiness

a dispassionate hollowness

in this strategy of stone

and stately alienation

living without aliveness

until a long silenced voice

exploiting

the mountain's resplendent allure

impregnated by the rising sun

wonders why

captures mind and body

in a breathless rush of inspiration

and flees toward

 

The Day Face

 

I leave the city's urban sprawl

Responding to an inner call

Something silent for too long

Has broken free and sweeps along

And with a child's exuberance

Forsakes my current arrogance

The mundane self has no say

It's lost its voice for this day

 

A day that's bright with freshened air

A day with secrets to lay bare

Another serendipity

This day is free of history

The road to ruin left behind

I've no idea what I'll find

A winding road, a country lane

I head toward a vast domain

When, at last, the pavement ends

I take the trail the mountain lends

And lose myself in scenery

 

Engulfed in endless greenery

Life is rife, a lavish teeming

An invitation to redeeming

It welcomes me with open arms

And shares with me its vital charms

Thus here upon the mountain's base

My soul has found a birthing place

Luscious ferns and stately trees

Witness me upon my knees

As years of tears locked away

Pour down upon this house of clay

Dissolving strategies of stone

Acknowledging my flesh and bone

This openness lacks frailty

It's more accessibility

The Life and I share communion

Intimate essential union

Intelligence and nourishment

Answering my discontent

 

The Life itself an education

Presents to me this contemplation

Life confined by separation

Empties one with deprivation

These words sink in through every pore

Reverberating at my core

I rise from deep within this space

Returning to the alpine face

The mountain sends a gentle wind

Which beckons me to ascend

A lighter step, an easy gait

Unburdened by oppressive weight

Treading not on path or trail

I ride upon the mountain's hale

To soar above the highest trees

Far beyond ascendancies

 

Then stand upon Olympic peak

With open eyes sincerely meek

And see below the world of man

Embraced within a cosmic plan

A fundamental harmony

Based upon a trinity

Compassion, sensitivity

Consideration making three

The plight of man I see revealed

Our very nature is concealed

Conceptual reality

Supporting personality

I see the error of my ways

A strategy for runaways

A child can't help avoiding pain

But as adults this is in vain

Defensive walls become a cell

Confining us to a living hell

The clarity upon this hill

Makes living life such a thrill

My body's flushed, I'm energized

By all of life I'm tantalized

I want it all, no stone unturned

With what it takes I'm not concerned

I ask the Life to bare my soul

Surrendering all old control

I fade into a waking dream

Pervaded by a heavy theme

All is lost, I've not begun

My self defined by

 

The Mountain

always the mountain

cyclopean prominence

nullifies life history, dreams and fears

my life turns, meanders (avoidance and denial)

a chronicle of directions changed

neither beginnings nor endings

stop, pause, go

interminable traffic

controlled by signposts

measured by milestones

confined by curbs, guardrails

the road itself

and always - the mountain

what deed or accomplishment

could raise its head

from the shadow

of this looming, omnipotent presence

judge and executioner

at the court of castration

ever an insignificance am I

in this ubiquitous confrontation

my pathetic defiance - I AM A MAN!

impotent whine from flaccid flesh

loathsome inadequacy encounters

antediluvian immortal

a world unto itself

invades and violates

trespasses on all my sacred ground

heaven and hell

agitating my dementia

a turbulent void of frantic neurosis

root bound

every effort

toward growth, nourishment, understanding

increases my constriction

asphyxiation by desperation

to escape the prison

of this silent rebuking projection

that penetrates my shallow plaintive veil

of narcissistic masochism

O! the anguish

the utter hopelessness

unimpaired deficient hole

me

loathing and fearing

this monolithic abomination

yet, it is the very foundation

of all my dreams and fantasies

(no dream of freedom for the free)

my humiliation is complete

I turn

primordial indignation

a raging savage beast

consumes the genesis of my abasement

a fury deeper than all of hell

cries out NO MORE!

released the cyclone of my soul

abandons all regard

lays existence on the line

and step toward

 

The Night Face

I leave the world of natural sight

And step into the endless night

Night of dark abysmal black

The brightest light could not attack

I try to will my eyes to see

One small wish for sanity

This night consumes even dreams

And swallows up primal screams

Night devoid of all direction

Incapable of reflection

Though sight and sound are left behind

That awesome presence I can find

I feel it there in front of me

Cyclopean immensity

Exudes a fearsome overcast

But my resolve remains steadfast

I stumble over rocky ground

And grope my way toward the mound

Disoriented and confused

I dare to face my accused

Crawling at a slow snail's pace

I finally reach the mountain's base

With trepidation start the climb

Over rocks slick with slime

And constantly slip and fall

Until I reach that endless wall

 

My nose is pressed against a face

That's lost within this pitch-black space

Crack and crevice; small toehold

God I wish I were more bold

I leave the plane of trepidation

Discover fear without cessation

Inch my way to unknown height

Every move take all my might

There's no way to turn around

Just plummet to the ground

I'm exhausted, fingers slip

The fear will not relax its grip

My chest is filled with blackened dread

My guts are once removed from dead

And now the winds of doubt assail

They use my mind as a flail

Stripping me of my resolve

Into failure I dissolve

From where I am I'll not let go

Death may come but not below

All my strength is now consumed

The savage beast is exhumed

My body flushed with raging fire

Again assaults this dreadful spire

I leave behind the wall of fear

To find black glass that won't adhere

 

My palm will only slip and slide

The mountain's trapped me on its side

Hanging there I succumb

Letting sheer terror come

A final act of defiance

Throw my life on that contrivance

And sail away into the night

My fall becomes a graceful flight

To stand atop the monolith

One lone soul upon the zenith

Looks upon the once concealed

The whole night sky now revealed

And I an empty cup to fill

Stand in awe upon this hill

As treasures with no earthly price

Reward demanded sacrifice

The night's essential quality

Emerges from eternity

The black itself a trinity

Distills the truth in all I see

Annihilating falsity

Quickened curiosity

About this sea of mystery

Suffused with all of life's beauty

I sail this sea far from shore

And fear it not anymore

Ebb and flow with the tide

The ocean's current is my guide

Float or sink by its whim

The moon arises from its rim

She battles the night in silver white

And nurses me on cool moonlight

My belly swells and takes its fill

Of unencumbered pure good will

Everlasting milky stream

Manifesting cosmic dream

Held within this flowing current

I sleep a soothing deep descent

And when the river's course is run

I awaken to

 

The Mountain

always the mountain

sentinel of the gods

universal sacred ground

progenitor of myth and legend

preverbal terrestrial

ancient

before a thought of time

and I sitting at its foot

ponder, question, admit

ignorance

of man and mountain

my priorness a pretense

a surface event

affected familiarity

of self, others, mountain

imaged associations

experience abducted by the mind

gutted of aliveness

stripped of its soul

filed for sterile reference

knowledge and experience

reduced to endless triangulations

projections, assumptions, identities

death in a tenuous charade of life

exposed lack of substance

ceaseless activity

masking internal poverty

true to a fault

ignorance is bliss

the extent of my ignorance

revealed

a child in the wilderness

longing

to know, to love, to be

sits

empty

upon the foot of sanctity

a true question embodied

 

Grace

 

the mountain

stirs, responds, opens

 

Grace

 

I

rise, step, enter

 

The Crucible of the Heart

I enter through the mountain's door

Into a realm of ancient lore

The mountain stirs, the door unmade

I'm swallowed whole and unafraid

Time and distance can't be gauged

A new dimension I've engaged

I'm ignorance and emptiness

Or openness and innocence

In blackest night my sight returns

In nothingness a question burns

Deep in the hall of the mountain king

Solid stone is whispering

It speaks in the tongue of primal earth

Antiquity's very berth

Descending bedrock passageways

A labyrinth, a quarried maze

I'm deep within the mountain's vein's

And sense the life it contains

This world within ageless stone

Is more alive than flesh and bone

The energies are rich and sweet

A rhythmic pulse, a sound heartbeat

I'm swept upon a swift downdraft

This artery an endless shaft

Pierces ore and molten core

Beyond a dream's farthest shore

A crystal cave, a work of art

The crucible of the heart

Here within the heart's lodestone

Love of truth sits on the throne

I'm carried to a rendezvous

An alchemist steps in view

He's clothed in every ancient rune

His energy a vast typhoon

He welcomes me with words unsaid

In his hand my heart of lead

The light and sound an orchestra

The world implodes supernova

Everything is muted light

Opalescent pearly white

The alchemist is pure presence

The heart a golden eloquence

No art or words could touch this spell

That permeates every cell

It speaks of love, but not a word

It sings a song no ear has heard

Everything I've suffered for

All the longing at my core

The emptiness, the poverty

The burning hunger just to be

Is all fulfilled by what I see

A merging gold sublimity

I reach to take this blessing in

I'm back in chambered crystalline

The alchemist shakes his head

In his hand my heart of lead

Listen to the words I speak

They hold the key to all you seek

Quicksilver slips through grasping hand

The heart's desire one can't command

When you reach to take control

You lose the grace of the soul

Life is one simple choice

It's made without a human voice

To search for life in vain

The Life is closer than your vein

This lump of lead to you seems dead

The bright light show you seek instead

But everything you have known

Exists within this leaden stone

The key to life lies in the heart,,,

(to be continued)