Mountain Climbing In Switzerland
... sitting on a mountaintop in Switzerland
Looking down on the glaciers below
As they empty into a small See,
Their melt rushing down the mountain in an icy torrent
Of dissolved minerals and melted snow
–––––––––––––Below my feet,
And we've built a small cairn
–On this mountain ridge
––Where no one has been
–––––For such a long time,
Maybe never ...

Trees turning gold in the Autumn light,
Scattered among the firs and cedars;
Are they beeches and oaks?
I don't know, it doesn't seem to matter:
We've got a mountain cat for a friend
And yesterday,
––––We were on the Matterhorn!

Don't know where I'll be tomorrow
––––Maybe on some high mountaintop
Looking down on the valleys below;
––––Alpine flowers in blue, yellow, or white
So many species from every family
––––Dancing in the grass in the autumn light
Their cousins are in the valleys below
––––Where the air is warm and mild
And we're up beyond the tree line
Almost where no plants grow
Just bare dry lichens clinging to the rocks
––––In the cool sunshine's glow.

We're clinging to the rocks
––––Trying not to fall so far
Up above the birds and the trees
––––We can touch the stars ...

We're up here alone, not a soul around
And the rushing of a glacier fed torrent
Is the only sound
Filling up the clear blue sky;
Piles of gravel and sand chipped away
From high mountain crags
By the ice that never melts away;
Our cairn is made from the splinters
Of weather chipped rock and stone
So many shapes and colours for a cairn on a mountain,
Perched up there all alone.
Are they Micas and Schists,
––––Marbles and Shales? I don't know;
I'm no geologist
––––Sitting on top of the world
Where only cool breezes blow
––––Watching the dying sun go down
In a blaze of glacial light.
––––We bathed in the glacial torrent,
Green and murky with dissolved minerals;
––––It tastes like new snow
All fresh and white,
––––So icy, it burns going down.

Mountain sheep, long furry hair
––––and chunky bells tingling
They almost let you touch them
––––before they slip away
––––––––into the cool mists
–––––––––––of the dark mountain ...

When we come back down,
We'll run all the way
As the sun falls behind a ridge
At the end of the shortened day;
We'll cross the glacial torrent on a stone bridge,
For we must hurry,
It's dangerous up here
When the sun goes down
And the black squirrel with tufted ears
Beckons us go ...
There's a mountain goat in the valley
Where the torrent plunges below;
A treacherous fall for us
Is an everyday walk for him
In deep cleft gorges where the icy waters flow,
Climbing up and down sheer cliffs
We could never dream of daring.

Beyond the snow
––––there's only glaciers and rock
––––––––gravel beds and green mud, soft and fine
Our cairn is a lonely beacon
––––for other hikers to see ...

The Matterhorn was such a grueling climb
––––Up to Schwartzersee and beyond
I never thought I'ld make it
––––The air's so thin and cold,
And the climb so steep.
––––You see nothing but rocks and trees
––––––––For most of the ascent;
It's only when you're finally there
––––Where the view of the Matterhorn is spectacular
––––––––Better than all the photographs
––––––––––––That you know it was worth the pain ...
We'd have gone all the way,
But the trail was under repair

The climb up to Adelweiss and Stift
––––Is just as steep and hard
But the view up the gorge
––––Is superb, truly gorgeous!
And you don't feel the pain
––––Of climbing, one rugged step up after another
––––––––On and on
––––––––––––Seemingly forever ...

Perhaps someday, we'll die up here;
We could have yesterday
Making our way down the Matterhorn
Following our own trail that didn't exist!
Another set of statistics
On the Matterhorn's barren slopes,
But the adventure is worth the risk.

And tomorrow perhaps,
––––We'll try again!

(Zermat, October 1985)