Mountain Poetry

Psalm 121
I lift my eyes up, up to the mountain. Where does my help come from?
My help comes from You, Maker of Heaven, Creator of the Earth.

Chris Owen wrote:Who Has Known Heights Who has known heights and depths, shall not again Know peace--not as the calm heart knows Low, ivied walls; a garden close; The old enchantment of a rose. And though he tread the humble ways of men, He shall not speak the common tongue again. Who has known heights, shall bear forevermore An incommunicable thing That hurts his heart, as if a wing Beat at the portal, challenging; And yet-lured by the gleam his vision wore,-- Who once has trodden stars seeks peace no more. Mary Brent Whiteside

Excerpt from Mount Blanc by Shelly

The wilderness' has a mysterious tongue
Which teaches awful doubt, or faith so mild,
So solemn, so serene, that man may be,
But for such faith, with nature reconciled;
Thou hast a voice, great Mountain, to repeal
Large codes of fraud and woe; not understood
By all, but which the wise, and great, and good
interpret, or make felt, or deeply feel.

WDW4 wrote: I like that one alot. JacksonLandFill - Psalm 19 is a great outdoorsman's psalm as well.

This is my personal favorite, as it is a very heartfelt remembrance of one of the UK's finest climbers, Colin Kirkus by his brother Guy. Mountains are indeed one thing, but all of my dearest memories involve something more than geography, they involve people that I love or have loved.

HANDS OF A CLIMBER

Faces fade with too much emphasis.
The blank illumination of yearning,
nebulous with shadows, loses touch
with sane reality - a dream remains.

Could I but catch one windswept moment
to energise my desolation
into the ecstasy of remembered love!
And yet, one vision leaps exultant.

Hands of a climber, vital, tense.
Fingers conscious of reach, exploring smoothness
as a blind man touches inanimate loves
for the last time, moving forward gladly.

Passion expressed by the body poised
on the edge of vastness, motionless, unyielding,
until the rapture passes, hold roughen upwards,
delightfully, towards the impassive summit.

Only now, hands idle, laid aside,
all reckoning over, endeavour pauses.
Eyes receive the muscles’ lost nobility
gratefully, softened by a new hill dream.

Guy Kirkus (1945)

Poetry zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

Your sad opinion is noted.

Before the breathin' air is gone,
Before the sun is just a bright spot in the nighttime,
Out where the rivers like to run
I stand alone and take back somethin' worth rememberin'

Three Dog Night (but I find R.E.M.'s cover to be more pleasing generally)

This is the song my wife and I have made a habit of listening to when we pull out of your driveway on the way to a climbing/National Parks/biking/skiing trip.