halfway up the mountain you
pause for a catch
and when your panting settles out
the hemlock grove so still
no breeze no crow no thrum of airplane
no distant deer hunter potting targets
just the high ringing in your ears that is
your brain struggling to calm itself
in this cool cathedral clearing
there your breath slows but wars
drag on ignoring your long-distance
attempts at empathy you are no more
than a brittle stem on this old-growth
slope which has witnessed cycles
upon cycles of windfall and decay
you are inert for now in this tenuous
day catching a few weak shafts
of autumnal sun leaking down
through the canopy cold moisture
quenching your butt through the duff
hush you cannot begin to glean
what is given only to you
Click here to read Robbie Gamble on the origin of the poem.
Image by Alexandra on Unsplash.com, licensed under CC 2.0.
Robbie Gamble:
I often begin to compose poems in my head when I’m out walking. My senses are engaged with the natural world, my blood is pumping, and my mind is loose and associative, a state which opens me up to poetic possibilities. “Pause” emerged from an autumnal hike in Vermont’s Green Mountains, when I was feeling burdened by the devolving conflicts in Gaza and the Ukraine, and a general sense of helplessness about the dreary state of the world. I usually try to leave such feelings at the trailhead when I set out on a hike, but this day they persisted until I huffed up a steep pitch of trail to come out into a stately grove of old hemlock trees, and the majesty and stillness of the scene stopped me in my tracks. Dan Berrigan, the great Jesuit theologian, poet, and activist was fond of intoning “Don’t just do something — stand there,” and I came to the realization that this was one of those moments he was talking about. I stood, and then I sat down for a while on a mossy embankment, and the poem seeped out.
Robbie Gamble (he/him) is the author of A Can of Pinto Beans (Lily Poetry Review Press, 2022). His poems have appeared in the Post Road, Whale Road Review, RHINO, Salamander, and The Sun. He divides his time between Boston and Vermont.
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