Tear down that sculpted,
perfect mountain that lives in your head.
Its intimidation is not for all,
and most certainly not for you.
It won’t tell you of its jagged faults
and glacier-scoured rock, and will
surely not whisper of the legions of fallen snags
and centuries of eroded pebbles and sand
that are now missing. All lost to gravity,
drawn somewhere downhill.
Scores of acres lie scorched and bared by fires.
Scarred firs still trying to fully breathe, tremble
in winter winds up past the scree slopes
on its southeast side.
Legions of beetles chew into the bark
of its sheltering forests, killing the branched
beings with a million tiny torturous bites.
Delivered daily in unison
That perfect mountain’s stone heart once flowed.
Growing upward from the depths as molten
magma, its heart did finally stop. It cooled
and lay hardened for eons
and grew no more.
It casts a mighty silhouette.
Impressive and prominent, sometimes snow-topped
with orange and red hues in, “the golden hours
of the day.”
But it is succumbing to earth’s eternal pull.
